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By Jomar canlas, Reporter
The Supreme Court on Thursday lifted a restraining order issued by a
Pasig City court against the government’s electronic passport
project.
The Court’s Third Division
allowed of the Department of Foreign Affairs to start the process of
awarding the contract for the printing of machine-readable
passports.
The electronic passport is to
replace the manually prepared passport being issued by the DFA. The
project was to have been launched several years ago, but the court
case put it on hold.
The DFA has warned that its
supply of the present passports would run out by June. The
department and Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas had petitioned the
Supreme Court to order Judge Franco Falcon of Branch 71 of the Pasig
Regional Trial Court to desist from implementing the TRO and from
conducting further proceedings in the case.
In a two-page ruling written by
Associate Justice Consuelo Ynares-Santiago, the Supreme Court
granted the DFA and Bangko Sentral’s petition.
Falcon had issued the TRO on the
request of the BCA International Corp. to prevent the government
from awarding the contract it signed with BCA for the e-passport
project to another firm.
In September 2000, the National
Economic Development Authority approved the Machine Readable
Passport and Visa Project (MRP/V Project) to modernize the DFA’s
passport and visa processing system.
The DFA entered into a
Build-Operate-Transfer agreement with BCA for the project.
In April 2002, the agreement was
amended to harmonize it with the Implementing Rules and Regulations
of the Build-Operate-Transfer Law. To conform to the rules, BCA
incorporated a project company, Philippine Passport Corp. (“Philpass”),
to implement the project.
DFA argued that because of the
delays in implementing of project and the financial incapability of
BCA and Philpass it was compelled to terminate the agreement.
BCA filed for arbitration before
the Philippine Dispute Resolution Center Inc. but the DFA declined,
saying the agreement did not specify which body or institution was
authorized to settle the dispute.
In May 2006, the DFA and Bangko
Sentral signed a Memorandum of Agreement to solicit bids for the
project. BCA sought a TRO from the Pasig court.
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