MANILA: The Philippines said on Monday it is in talks with two potential partners, including Hong Kong's MTR Corp Ltd, for a railway project that will allow more access to a city soon to rise near the capital region.
"What we're going to do is to combine our property and their expertise. It's a joint venture to share the risk," Arnel Paciano Casanova, president and CEO of state-run Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA), told reporters.
He declined to identify the second potential partner citing a confidentiality agreement, and could not give a cost estimate.
"We are talking to different parties, we are opening this opportunity to everyone," he said. "We want to sign contracts within the year."
The BCDA, the agency looking to develop with private partners the 9,450-hectare Clark Green City, could take up to a 45 percent stake in the railway project, he said.
The master planned city will rise in the Clark Special Economic Zone, a former US military base in Pampanga, north of Manila.
The tender process for the initial phase of the Clark Green City project, which involves 254 hectares, is set to begin this quarter.
Major Philippine property firms and foreign companies such as Sumitomo Corp, Hitachi Ltd, Farglory Land Development Co Ltd and Mitsubishi Corp have expressed interest in the project, according to Casanova.
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