Mayor Agustin Perdices said the city government is considering the Philippine Ports Authority's recommendation for it to adopt the alternative plan of Palafox, an established developer, in the implementation of the multi-million peso Dumaguete port terminal building.

However, Perdices said, they still have to do a further study on the Palafox proposal, which will cost the PPA only about P50 million, as opposed to the P89 million project cost proposed by the city government.

Last week, Gov. George Arnaiz returned from Manila with a perspective of the Palafox plan from the PPA, which he turned over to Perdices for review. The governor said he will leave it up to the mayor to decide on the PPA recommendation.

Perdices said the city will still need to study the details of the plan, although he believes that the alternative plan would also come out well as Palafox is a respected architectural office, locally and internationally.

Perdices admitted that he realizes if the city government will insist on its plan instead, it could be delayed for another one or two years, considering rigid government processes.

But he said if PPA has a ready budget of P50 million for the project, and they approve it just like what they did in Bataan, "it looks like I could say that we will accept it, but we would like to see more details of the building".

Perdices said he is happy to know the PPA has already included in its budget this year the Dumaguete port terminal project, but expressed apprehension it could be affected due to Congress still deliberating on the 2006 national budget.

"I hope the absence of a national budget this year will not impact on the Dumaguete port project, especially because we are still re-enacting on last year's national budget", he added.

But Perdices said that Dumaguete should just look on the positive side and be thankful that PPA has already included the city port in its list of projects for the year. *JG

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