Best airport, aww c'mon

BEST, WE just cannot be.

So we make out the best even for just also-ran finishes.

Hence, the Filipino nation going gaga over Shamcey Supsup’s 3^rd runner-up finish in the 2011 Miss Universe pageant.

Hence, finding major, major accomplishment in Venus Raj’s placing 4^th runner-up  in the 2010  edition of the same contest.

Closer home, the 4^th place ranking of City of San Fernando Mayor Oscar S. Rodriguez is more than enough reason to append to his name the honorific “world class.”

Worst, we have the penchant to be.

Topping the corruption and impunity indices in this part of the globe, year after year.

Worst as worst can only be.

Setting the record for the most number of journalists killed in a single incident, in all the world, in all of history.  

Worst even in aviation facility.

The Ninoy Aquino International Airport voted the world’s worst airport for 2011 in a global poll conducted by The Guide to Sleeping in Airports, a site that reviews the quality and facilities of the world’s airports.     

Mired in the worst-to-be, 4^th    and 3^rd finishes are indeed enough cause for revelry.

It takes no surprise thus for the salutatory and congratulatory paroxysm that greeted the news of the Clark International Airport ranking 3^rd in the "World's Best Airport Freezone" list of fDi Magazine contained in its "Global Free Zones of the Future 2012/13" report.   

Published by the Financial Times Business Group of London, fDi Magazine is a bi-monthly news and foreign direct investment publication.

Also cited in the same report was the Clark Freeport Zone as the 8^th best freeport zone in the world, with Dubai Airport Free Zone being named the best.

This is no denigration of the recognition given the CIA. Nor is it to demean the giver. It is just to put the citation in context.

By its very nomenclature – best airport freezones – the recognition has little, if anything, to do with infrastructure and facilities or services. It has everything to do with location, location, location.

And location is Clark’s best asset, its expanse, its accessibility, aye, its equidistance to and from major regional destinations, its being at the very pith of a freeport. By accident of geography therefore, the Clark International Airport is already “it” when it comes to airport freezones.

So, what is there to celebrate in the recognition of what has always been there?

If any, this is a cause for another barrage of tirades against the Clark International Airport Corp. for failing to tap the full potential of the Clark airport to be not only the nation’s premier international gateway, but among the Asia-Pacific region’s best. That potential all obvious in the aforecited accident of geography.

No other airport in the region is as centrally located as Clark, spanning distances within 1.5 hours to 3.5 hours max, from Kota Kinabalu, Hong Kong and Macau, to Bangkok, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur.

Indeed, what is there to celebrate in the recognition of what has always been a given fact?

If any, the only consolation we can get out of this “World’s Best Airport Freezone” citation is the public acknowledgment coming from Malacanang that government is working to improve the airport’s facilities.

"We welcome the assessment made by the London Financial Times Group. Certainly, we are in the process of improving our airport facilities... That has been the commitment made by Transportation and Communications Secretary Mar Roxas to the President and, therefore, the said agency will exert all its best efforts to improve the facilities of not only Clark but also the other airports." So Presidential Spokesperson Edwin Lacierda said.

On second thought, no consolation with Roxas mentioned there.

So what is Roxas concretely showing at the Clark International Airport for that “commitment made to the President”?

So sorry to sound grouchy, but with Roxas, there simply is no way for the Clark International Airport to ever become what it is destined to be – the Philippines’ premier international gateway.

Why, for over a year now as chairman of the board of CIAC, has Roxas even attended just one board meeting?

That just shows how (un)committed this loser is when it comes to anything Clark.

As anything and everything good at the Clark International Airport happen despite Roxas, so anything and everything bad happen because of Roxas.    

Roxas is the albatross around the President’s neck.

The earlier PNoy takes cognizance of this, the better for the people of Central and Northern Luzon.

The later PNoy realizes this, the better for Jejomar Binay. You’re a dummy if you still ask why.