Lorenzana will ”most probably” approve deal between Mislatel, AFP

October 18, 2019

Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said he will "most probably" approve the memorandum of agreement (MOA) signed between a China-linked telecommunications company and the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP).

"Nothing wrong. It's the same as Globe and Smart," Lorenzana said when asked about the agreement of AFP with the Mindanao Islamic Telephone Company (Mislatel).

"I most probably will sign it," he said.

The Mislatel consortium, which will adopt the name Dito Telecommunity, is composed of Chelsea Logistics and Infrastructure Holdings Corp., Udenna Corp, and China Telecom.

Lorenzana said he hasn't decided whether he will sign the MOA as the Senate asked for the copy of the contract for the new telco and documents of the two other telcos.

"When we defended our budget in the Senate, they asked us, they requested us to submit the contract for the third telco and the documents for the other two," he said.

"According to them they are going to look at it... they have been them for two weeks already, two and a half weeks," he added.

It can be recalled that under the agreement signed between the AFP and Mislatel, the military will allow the China-linked Telco to build communication facilities inside military camps. Robina Asido/DMS