San Miguel Corp. has lost over P7 billion in foregone revenues for its failure to increase toll at the South Luzon Expressway since 2012.
“We have more than P7 billion in foregone revenues from periodic toll increases that were never granted. Toll increases are part of our contract,” said San Miguel president and chief operating officer Ramon Ang.
“They are needed for us to recover our investment and be able to pay back the money we borrowed to build or expand infrastructure. We have not been allowed to implement any increases since 2012,” he added.
Ang made the statement after Toll Regulatory Board private sector representative Raymundo Junia’blamed the P10-billion Skyway Extension project for the one-day spike in traffic at SLEX.
Junia wants a discount on toll on the expressway following a traffic jam on Sept. 25, with the start of construction of the Skyway Extension.
Ang said suspending the toll would worsen the traffic situation at the South Luzon Expressway and could damage San Miguel’s credit standing from banks.
“If you suspend toll fees, that will not really bring relief. It will make the problem worse. More vehicles will flood the expressways, and nobody will be happy because of the increasing congestion,” he said.
Ang said suspending toll would violate the company’s concession agreement, and worse, damage its standing with the banks.
“In our loan covenants, there are stipulations about earning back the money we borrowed to build or improve our infrastructure. If banks see that government can just stop honoring concession contracts, they will also stop lending to local companies. Investor confidence will go down,” he said.
Ang said perennial traffic on the SLEX heading to Alabang was caused primarily by the design limitations of the SLEX-Alabang area that the company inherited from the former concessionaire.
SLEX from Susana Heights has five lanes,. The road narrows at the Alabang viaduct to just three, creating a bottleneck.
“This has always been the problem of motorists coming from the south. It’s a chokepoint,” Ang said.
“Every year, our traffic volume increases. There’s tremendous growth in the southern provinces—Cavite, Batangas, Laguna. Just the amount of new subdivisions is staggering. This is precisely why we need a bold, new, long-term solution. We want to make both northbound and southbound lanes have five lanes each.”
The Skyway Extension will add 4,500 vehicles per hour on the northbound side and 3,000 more vehicles per hour on the southbound section. It will make travel faster and easier as motorists will be able to bypass the Alabang viaduct and even EDSA, if they’re headed to either NAIA, Makati, Manila, Quezon City or beyond.