CRANE-Caramoan

Bombase

The Department of Finance may start very soon to compel each town in the Third District of Camarines Sur to pay the $16 million loan incurred by the Partido Development Administration (PDA) sometime in 1998 which by now must have ballooned to about $20 million or an obligation of no less than P100 million for every town.

In informing Third District constituents how much they have been chained to indebtedness by incumbent Congressman Noli Fuentebella, Tigaon Mayor Elmo Bombase also emphasized the continuing burden on the people brought by jthe PDA which as admitted by its own officials is losing no less than P100 million annually.

Mayor Bombase, who is KAMPI candidate for congressman in the Third District, also said from the very beginning Conressman Fuentebella was suspected of having some ulterior motives in working for the loan with Denmark International Development Agency (DANIDA) because he insisted in having the maximum loanable amount doubled to $16 million.

“This means that all our constituents in the Third District will be paying this huge obligation which may not have gone entirely to the PDA water system but instead to the pockets of some people”, Mayor Bombase, an engineer who used to be one of the chief planners of the Bicol River Basin Development Program pointed out. “What is more deplorable is that the water system is not able to serve most of the barangays that really need potable water supply, as a result of which epidemics of water-borne diseases like cholera and El Tor continue to occur in remote mountain and coastal barangays”, Bombase also stressed.

Bombase who has served for three terms as Tigaon mayor and as president of the League of Municipalities of the Philippines, Camarines Sur Chapter, also warned that another huge anomaly is going on in supposed road rehabilitation projects in the Third District funded by about P200 million, part of which may have been already collected without any accomplishment.

The project package involved repair of road sections largely along the Caramoan Peninsula Road, including desilting of the Lagonoy River covering 12 projects, each with an identical allocation of P14,750,000.00.

Bombase said sources indicated that Congressman Fuentebella and Gov. L-Ray Villafuerte are behind the mysterious project package which may have helped facilitate their reported alliance.
These projects whose bidding was said to be conducted in November yet last year include:

1.Rehabilitation and improvement of Tigaon-Goa-San Jose-Lagonoy-Guijalo Road via San Vicente road – P14,750,000.00;
Rehabilitation and improvement of Tigaon-Goa-San Jose-Lagonoy-Guijalo Road via San Vicente road – P14,750,000.00;
Rehabilitation and improvement of Teres-Caramoan-Guijalo road, P14,750,000.00;
Rehabilitation and improvement of Teres-Caramoan-Guijalo road, P14,750,000.00;
Rehabilitation and improvement of the Lagonoy-Presentacion road, P14,750,000.00;
Rehabilitation and improvement of the Lagonoy-Garchitorena road, P14,750,000.00;
Rehabilitation and improvement of Tigaon-Goa-San Jose-Lagonoy-Guijalo Road via San Vicente road – P14,750,000.00;
Rehabilitation and improvement of Tinambac-Siruma road P14,750,000.00;
Rehabilitation and improvement of the Tigaon-Albay boundary;
Rehabilitation and improvement of the San Rafael-Mampirao-San Jose road, P14,750,000.00;
Rehabilitation and improvement of the Goa-Digdigon-San Isidro road, P14,750,000.00; and
Desilting of Lagonoy River, P14,750,000.00.