PRESIDENT Rodrigo R. Duterte has issued an executive order (EO) including the Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA) in the Cabinet cluster on infrastructure.
Mr. Duterte signed EO 86 on July 25, which the Palace released to reporters on Tuesday, amending EO 24 (series of 2017). The order bears the title “Reorganizing the Cabinet Clusters System by integrating good governance and anti-corruption in the policy frameworks of all the clusters and creating the infrastructure cluster and participatory governance cluster.”
EO 24 created the infrastructure cluster to focus on infrastructure development as a means of realizing the government’s 10-point economic agenda.
EO 86 adds the BCDA to the cluster.
“The mandate of the BCDA in the conversion of the Clark and Subic military reservations and their extensions into alternative productive uses, its vital infrastructure projects such as tollways, railways, airports, seaports, and new economic growth corridor, and its role in the Build, Build, Build program, warrant its inclusion as a member of the infrastructure cluster,” the EO reads.
The infrastructure cluster is chaired by the Secretary of Public Works and Highways. Other members of the cluster, apart from the BCDA president, are the Executive Secretary, Cabinet Secretary, and heads of the Presidential Management Staff, and representatives from the Departments of Interior and Local Government, Budget, Transportation, Finance, Information and Communications Technology, Trade and Industry, Agriculture, Health, Social Welfare and Development, Education and Tourism, as well as the National Economic and Development Authority. — Arjay L. Balinbin
