Road project to generate100,000 jobs

President Gloria Arroyo unveiled Thursday an ambitious P38-billion road project of the Metro Manila Tollways Corp. that would boost the government’s infrastructure development program and create more than 100,000 jobs during the five-year construction period.

In a related development, the lifting of the ban on sending Filipino workers to Lebanon and Jordan would not be implemented right away, despite the President’s approval. The lifting would also create more jobs opportunities for Filipinos.

According to a statement on Tuesday, the P38-billion road project includes P2.1 billion that would link the North Luzon Expressway with Circumferential Road 5 (C-5), P16 billion for a highway connecting North Luzon Expressway to the South Luzon Expressway, and more than P10 billion for the construction of Skyway Stage 2.

“More than one hundred thousand jobs are available in the construction of this network,” Mrs. Arroyo said in a chat with construction workers and truck drivers at the site.

She added that the planned P2-billion alternate entry point to the North Luzon Expressway, Metro Manila’s gateway to Central and Northern Luzon, would decongest traffic in the capital region.

The planned connector road that will link the North Luzon Expressway (NLEX) to the South Luzon Expressway (SLEX) is an “elevated, 13-kilometer, four-way expressway linking the NLEX to the SLEX and Skyway through Road C-3 in Caloocan and Buendia Avenue in Makati City,” according to the Metro Manila Tollways Corp.

It added that the connector road should reduce travel time between the highways from about an hour to between 15 and 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, the planned Skyway Stage 2 “will extend the existing Skyway from Bicutan to Alabang in Muntinlupa City, while facilitating the needed rehabilitation works on the existing expressway including toll collection systems and the toll plazas.”

The 100,000 or so construction workers needed for the project would complement the 880 now employed by the tollway corporation.

Jobs in Lebanon, Jordan

Ed Malaya, the acting spokesman of the Department of Foreign Affairs, said also Thursday that the government could not lift the ban on the deployment of Filipino workers to Lebanon and Jordan immediately.

“We have recommended a policy decision to lift the ban [in Lebanon and Jordan], but the timing of implementing any lifting would be for the Foreign Affairs and Labor and Employment departments to decide,” Malaya told The Manila Times in a telephone interview.

“As of now, the ban stays in all five countries,” he said, adding that no date has been set for the lifting of the bans.

In a press conference Tuesday, Conejos said the security situation in Lebanon has improved, but the ban would remain in place until the conclusion of a bilateral labor cooperation agreement between that country and the Philippines.

Philippine negotiators want more protection for Filipino workers, such an entitlement to a minimum wage, reasonable rest periods and decent working and living conditions.

“For Lebanon and Jordan, we are in the process of negotiating the bilateral cooperation agreements,” Conejos said. “We are coming closer to signing these agreements.”

Bans in place

Conejos said the travel bans to Afghanistan, Iraq and Nigeria remain in place—mainly because of security concerns in those countries.

Vice-President Noli de Castro said that land-based Filipino workers who have been working for more than 10 years in Lagos, Nigeria, could be issued a special travel permit to work there.

De Castro, also the Presidential Adviser on Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs), explained that Filipino workers eligible for obtaining a special travel permit are only those employed in safer areas, not the Niger Delta where there is high incidence of hijacking.

“This is good news to those Filipino professionals in Nigeria who have been wishing to take a vacation back home,” he added. “Their problem before was that once they got home, they cannot go back to Nigeria because of the ban.”
–Angelo S. Samonte And Llanesca T. Panti, Manila Times