Megawide World Citi Consortium Inc., a unit of listed Megawide Construction Corp., terminated a P5.7-billion contract with the Health Department to modernize the Philippine Orthopedic Center after a two-year delay in the awarding of the job.
“Megawide has terminated the contract for the modernization of the Philippine Orthopedic Center with the Department of Health. This is a decision driven by the two-year delay in awarding of the certificate of possession, among others, and not one that was made lightly,” the company said in a statement.
“We participated in the tender with the belief that our fellow Filipinos deserve an efficient hospital facility to complement the care and service already shown by the staff of POC,” it added.
Megawide said despite the difficulties in getting the contract, it was committed supporting the Health Department’s vision for inclusive healthcare for all Filipinos.
Analysts said Megawide’s termination of the build-operate-transfer agreement with the government was not a good sign for the other Public Private Partnership projects in the pipeline that the Aquino administration plans to bid out.
Regina Capital Development Corp. said the termination again raised questions on the integrity of contracts under the PPP program.
When asked if Megawide would continue to purse other PPP projects given the setback, Megawide chief marketing officer Louie Ferrer said: “It is hard to comment on that. But this issue is a moving concern moving forward.”
The modernization of Philippine Orthopedic Center was one the five PPP projects that Megawide won in a public bidding.
The others were the P17.5-billion Mactan Cebu International Airport expansion program with Bangalore-based GMR Infrastructure; the P16.42-billion PPP for School Infrastructure project phase I; the P3.86-billion PSIP phase II; and the P2.5-billion Integrated Transport System-Southwest Terminal.
Megawide World Citi bagged the country’s first hospital PPP project in 2013.
It was the sole bidder for the project, which involves the construction, operation and maintenance of a 700-bed facility that will be built inside the National Kidney Transplant Institute compound along East Ave. in Quezon City.
The POC operates at Maria Clara corner Banawe Streets., also in Quezon City.
Several groups, including hospital employees, haved opposed the modernization project.
POC employees have expressed fears about the possibility of losing their jobs once the management is taken over by the private companies, while some protesters said the modernization would translate into higher hospital costs, making health care even more inaccessible and unaffordable to the majority.
