The Maritime Industry Authority (MARINA) reiterated on Monday, March 20, that it has not yet issued an amended Certificate of Public Convenience (CPC) to the owner of the sunken motor tanker (MT) Princess Empress, the RDC Reield Marine Services, Inc., casting doubt on the vessel’s authority to sail at sea and operate. MT Princess Empress sank off Naujan, Oriental Mindoro on Feb. 28 while carrying 800,000 liters of industrial fuel oil. “As confirmed by our Administrator [lawyer Hernani Fabia] in the Senate inquiry, the company has a valid CPC. It’s a company CPC but there is no CPC amendment as of yet,” lawyer Sharon Aledo, MARINA spokesperson and director of the agency’s Legal Service, said in a livestreamed press conference at the MARINA Building in Port Area, Manila. A CPC is an authorization issued by the MARINA to a vessel “for a domestic water transportation service for commercial/public use for which no franchise, either municipal or legislative is required by law.” In a Senate inquiry last March 14, Administrator Fabia said that the agency has yet to issue an amended CPC to RDC Reield Marine Services, Inc. after the recent addition of MT Princess Empress to its fleet. On the same day, Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) spokesperson Rear Adm. Armando Balilo showed a copy of the supposed [amended CPC of RDC Reield Marine Services, Inc.](https://mb.com.ph/2023/3/14/pcg-bares-cpc-of-sunken-mt-princess-empress) to the media, and held a press conference the following day to present the document publicly. The document included a supposed MARINA decision dated Nov. 16, 2022 which amended the CPC of RDC Rield Marine Services, Inc. and allowed the sunken tanker “to effect the permanent addition of the ship/tanker, M/TKR Princess Empress, to the company’s fleet.” But Aledo bared that the MARINA “has not yet issued any decision,” emphasizing that RDC Reield Marine Services, Inc.’s application for a CPC amendment “is ongoing.”  “As also stated by our Administrator, there are still some lacking documents and we follow a particular process,” Aledo said, citing Republic Act 9295 or the Domestic Shipping Development Act of 2004 as amended. “Once the screening process has been completed and all documents – documentary, jurisdictional, qualification requirements – are all complied with, the application will be published and thereafter will be set for hearing. This process [has] not happened yet,” she stressed. Aledo said that the Department of Transportation (DOTr) was already investigating the supposed amended CPC that was presented to the public by the PCG. Balilo previously stated that the PCG only relied to the document shown to them by the MT Princess Empress that's why they allowed the oil tanker to sail. For RDC’s part, RDC Vice President Fritzie Tee had said during the March 14 Senate inquiry that their company had started submitting all the necessary requirements in November 2022 so they could secure the amended CPC, and finished passing the documents the following month.

Oil spill response fund

Meanwhile, Aledo revealed that the PCG has requested over P33 million in funding from the MARINA’s Oil Pollution Management Fund (OPMF) so they could perform cleanup operations and prevent the oil slick from further spreading. “Last March 10, we received a letter request including a report of the incident from the PCG for the immediate containment and oil spill operations. This has been discussed by the OPMF committee. The amount requested by the PCG has been approved by the committee,” she disclosed. Asked how much was the amount the PCG requested for the oil spill response, Aledo answered: “It’s more than P33 million.” “There’s an OPMF committee resolution, it has been circulated since Thursday last week. We are just waiting to complete the signatures. The MARINA, through our Accounting Division, has already made coordination with our counterparts from the PCG. It [fund] will be released very, very soon,” she added.