Planned US oil depot risks PH security, warns group
A fishers’ group on Saturday expressed alarm over the US military’s planned oil depot off Davao Gulf, saying this would expose the country’s security.
“We have seen how countries in the Middle East that side with America and shelter its military bases have become vulnerable to Iran’s retaliatory attacks,” Pamalakaya national chair Fernando Hicap said in a statement.
“It is not in the interest of Filipinos to build any US military base in the country. It will certainly put the public at risk because of the provocative and warmongering nature of the US,” he said.
According to the website of the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), a unit of the US Department of Defense, the depot to be called the Defense Fuel Support Point will be established “along the western coast of the Davao Gulf to include Davao City, Davao Del Sur and Malalag Bay.”
The depot should have, within a four-year period, a storage capacity of 977,000 barrels of “US government-owned fuel” for its aircraft and warships.
In a solicitation published March 31, the DLA called for bid offers from US-based contractors until June 29.
Edca
Manila’s Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (Edca) with Washington—a 2014 executive agreement which the Supreme Court said does not require the Senate’s concurrence—provides, among other things, that “US forces, contractors, vehicles, vessels and aircraft” may conduct “refueling,” “bunkering,” “temporary maintenance” “prepositioning” and “deployment,” among other related activities.
The US currently runs a fuel depot, built in 2023, at the Mactan-Benito Ebuen Air Base in Cebu, one of the nine Edca sites in the country. —WITH REPORTS FROM JOHN ERIC MENDOZA AND INQUIRER RESEARCH
