Jean Alphonse D. Ponce Clarifies CEZA status

This pertains to the article titled “Cagayan town mayor asks Aquino to remove CEZA chief”, which your daily published recently. In the interest of fair play, please allow me to clarify several statements mentioned therein:

1. It is a misconception that the local government unit of Santa Ana in Cagayan retains supervision of both the LGU under the Office of the Mayor and the Cagayan Economic Zone Authority (CEZA), a government-owned and controlled corporation (GOCC) mandated to manage, supervise and develop the Cagayan Special Economic Zone and Freeport (CSEZFP), which is based in Santa Ana. These are two different and independent government entities that co-exist in one town. While the LGU is led by the town Mayor, the GOCC is headed by the Administrator/Chief Executive Officer. Ideally, the LGU should be an active partner of CEZA, which unfortunately is not the reality in this case.