DPWH dealing with right of way issues, says Villar

Public Works Secretary Mark Villar on Wednesday said that the government had achieved “significant progress” in dealing with right of way problems, especially in big-ticket projects, since the Duterte administration came to office.

Villar said in a statement that the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) had been able to “expedite the acquisition process” since he issued Department Order No. 65, which created a right of way task force, in May last year.

With the task force working, the DPWH managed to settle within a year and seven months all right of way issues in the North Luzon Expressway (NLEx) Harbor Link Segment 10 project, which had been stalled for over three decades, he added.

Passable this month

It acquired 100-percent possession of the project site in December last year, Villar said.

“We are happy to announce that the NLEx Harbor Link Project will be accessible to the public by January. When this is completed, travel time from C3 in Caloocan and NLEx will be reduced to 10 minutes,” he said.

The project consists of a 5.65-kilometer elevated expressway that stretches over NLEx from MacArthur Highway in Karuhatan, Valenzuela City, cuts through Malabon City and passes over C3 Road in Caloocan City, and the 2.6-km section between C3 Road and R10 in Navotas City.

“The next phase will connect it to R10 and reduce travel time from Port Area in Manila to Quezon City to approximately 10 minutes,” Villar said.

Decentralization

The DPWH is now concreting the additional 600-meter segment that would make 2.7 km of Mindanao Avenue Extension passable within the first quarter of this year.

“The project was started in the 1980s but was stopped for decades due to right of way issues. We are happy that it was during the term of President Duterte that we are able to deliver the project,” Villar said.

DO 65 helped to “decentralize and rationalize” DPWH processes, according to Abdul Halim Diron, chief of the agency’s Right-of-Way Acquisition and Enforcement Division.

“This time, instead of just the secretary, certain acts can already be performed by the regional directors and directors in the central office. If it’s a [regional] project, the regional director can already validate and approve transactions. So that helps hasten the acquisition,”  Diron said in an interview on Wednesday.

The order, he said, also cleared the way for the DPWH to improve its legal processes, with each regional office now having a legal division that deals with right of way matters.

If before there was only one lawyer handling a problem in an area, now there are at least five, he added.

The announcement of improvements came amid reports of projects being delayed because of unresolved right of way issues.

Diron attributed the delay in right of way payments to due diligence.

‘Improper payment’

The DPWH does not want “improper payment” to be made to landowners, he said.

Diron explained that in due diligence, certain problems may arise and cause delay in the release of payments, such as a landowner’s failure to submit  proper documents or the requirement for the DPWH to prove that private property will indeed be affected by the project.

“You have to understand that this is taxpayer money that we are using and we have to comply with Commission on Audit (COA) rules on payments. Our process here, as well as in [the] COA, is really document-based. It relies so much on official records that it could take a while to obtain them,” Diron said. 

Earlier this week, some 180 residents of Sariaya, Quezon province, reported that they had yet to be compensated for their properties that were affected by the construction of a 7.2-km, P467-million bypass whose development began three years ago.

The local public works office said some of the landowners had failed to submit proper documents, while the papers of those who had met the requirement were undergoing verification and authentication.

Diron said it was “not the practice” of the DPWH to start a project before acquiring right of way, noting that problems were inevitable once the project got started.

“Sometimes you can only spot an issue upon implementation. Let’s say you conducted a survey, made alignment plans then once you go down the landowner dies or sells his property … That’s where challenges crop up on our part. They really arise during implementation,” he said.

Balance of interests

Even after a court has decided in favor of the government in instances of expropriation, it also doesn’t mean that payments will be done immediately, Diron said.

“One of the limitations is if [the fund] is not allotted for a particular purpose, it needs appropriation. We have to balance the interest of the landowner [with] the interest of [the] government, which is to safeguard public funds and make sure that [payment] goes to the proper person,” he said.

It is easy to pay landowners, but it is so hard to undo an improper payment, Diron said.

“If there is delay, it’s for the benefit of the public and landowner,” he said.

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