DoTr’s unnecessary stumble on 2Go ‘ship rental’
TRANSPORTATION Secretary Arthur Tugade found himself in the public hot seat this week for reasons that were completely avoidable. In comments to the media, he intimated that the Department of Transportation was paying tens of millions of pesos to rent two ships of the 2Go Travel line for use as quarantine centers, which not only drew public fire toward the DoTr, but also provoked unnecessary criticism of one of the Philippines’ rising stars in the business world.
According to Tugade’s initial statement, the 2Go Group had originally asked for P120 million for two months’ rental of the ships. A “negotiating team” of the Transportation department was, however, able to reduce that amount to P35 million, he said. This latest minor controversy is disturbing on a number of levels and could have been avoided if Tugade had taken more care before discussing the arrangement with 2Go publicly because what he said initially turned out to be almost entirely wrong.
The government, through the DoTr, apparently made an unsolicited offer of P35 million, which 2Go declined. That raises another point. The idea of the government providing financial “stimulus” to large companies is anathema to most people. But the arrangement proposed with 2Go, even if the company had accepted the money, is both ethical and practical.
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