CAAP foils bid to sell 3 helicopters linked to Co

The Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) has blocked an apparent attempt to sell three helicopters, owned by companies connected to controversial former Ako Bicol rep. Zaldy Co, to foreign buyers.

- RAINIER ALLAN RONDA

Public Works Secretary Vince Dizon bared this yesterday as he explained that de-registration of an aircraft, registered in the country through CAAP, is a prerequisite to its sale.

“Three choppers were subject to an attempt to de-register,” he told reporters yesterday.

“There was a plan to sell them. Because you cannot sell the assets, and they cannot be bought, if they are not de-registered in the Philippines,” Dizon said in Filipino.

“It's good that we blocked this attempt to de-register,” he said.

Dizon said CAAP has a standing order that all of Co’s air assets, which had been found in the CAAP registry as among the air assets of people who have been implicated in the flood control scandal, should not be de-registered.

The DPWH chief, at a press briefing on Sept. 24, said the listing of air transport assets owned by those implicated in various ghost and substandard flood control projects, revealed that companies related to Co have air assets valued at P4.7 billion.

The CAAP listed 11 of Co's registered air assets under the names Misibis Aviation & Development Corp. and Hi Tone Construction Development Corp.

Aside from CAAP, Dizon had sent letters to the Land Registration Authority, Land Transportation Office and the Maritime Industry Authority last Sept. 16, asking for a listing of the land properties, motor vehicles, water vessels and aircraft that are in the name of the 26 former and current DPWH employees and six contractors that were subject of the graft complaint before the Office of the Ombudsman, in connection with the ghost and substandard flood control projects in Bulacan.