RP's Subic Bay gears up for APEC summit
RP's Subic Bay gears up for APEC summit
SUBIC BAY, Philippines (AFP): The summit of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum set for Nov. 25 is shaping up as a logistical nightmare, with senior officials facing the prospect of being put up in former military barracks here.
With security being an overriding concern, the Philippines picked the former repair and supply yard of the U.S. 7th fleet as the summit venue, bypassing the more conventional choice of Manila.
Moreover the occasion would provide free advertisement for Subic bay which the government is seeking to promote as a free port.
A "tentative scenario" sketched by the organizing committee features an unprecedented request to leaders of some of the world's most powerful countries to leave their official planes in Manila. They will be asked to share two "wide-bodied jets" for the 30-minute trip to Subic Bay.
However, the leaders will be free "to use their own aircraft if they wish, " Fernando Aristorenas, head of the legal department of the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority said at a press briefing here.
The leaders are to meet at a refurbished former Air Force officers' mess hall overlooking the Subic airport and Subic Bay, and each will be retiring to one of 21 luxury villas currently being built.
Sprucing up the spartan accommodations to measure up to summit standards will cost US$25 million, including repairs on the former Army barracks to bring the facility's total capacity up to 2,000 rooms and 4,000 beds.
The hosts expect 1,500 journalists to descend on Subic Bay to cover the one-day event -- but they will have to make do with 200 telephone lines shared with APEC officials and their staff.
The press center will be situated 20 minutes by land to the summit building. A bus service will be provided by the government. All other land traffic towards the building is banned.
The airport is capable of handling only 12 to 20 aircraft at a time. That will compel Federal Express, which has just located its regional Asian hub in Subic, to shut operations as no other flights are to be allowed for security reasons.
"Contingency measures" will be in place for typhoons and other acts of nature, but none were specified.
Subic Bay and Manila are linked by a highway that takes between four and five hours to traverse, including a five- kilometer (three-mile) stretch of bad roads caused by latent mudflow from nearby Pinatubo volcano, which erupted in 1991. A two-hour ferry service also operates.
If mudflow disrupts traffic, the APEC land traffic officials said there is an alternate route -- one which adds up to six hours' worth of additional travel time.
The Philippines, one of the poorest APEC economies, is promoting Subic Bay, as a premiere investment zone. The area used to be a U.S. Navy base until the United States decided to pull up stakes in November 1992.
Japanese and Taiwanese development aid is helping transform the facility into a free port and light industrial enclave.
Unless there is an APEC consensus, Taiwanese President Lee Teng-hui will be a no-show. He made a flying visit here in 1994 for a not-so-secret "vacation diplomacy" meeting with Philippine President Fidel Ramos. China protested.
Aside from the "two Chinas" and the hosts, APEC members also include the economies of Australia, Brunei, Canada, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Singapore and Thailand.