NLEX hiring 1,500 workers for ₱23-B Connector road

The NLEX Corporation yesterday announced it was hiring over 1,500 technical and skilled workers to ensure its ₱23-billion, 8-kilometer, North Luzon Expressway (NLEX) Connector road will be finished next year.

However, the tollway operator is giving priority to overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) displaced due to the COVID-19 pandemic, NLEX President and General Manager J. Luigi L. Bautista specified.

“With our ongoing projects, we can create more opportunities for people thus propel growth in the country,” he added.

“Being a government partner in infrastructure building, NLEX Corporation and the entire Metro Pacific Tollways group are keen in helping the economy recover.”

To speed up the construction of its road project, the tollways firm is also mobilizing more construction equipment at the site.

The NLEX Connector is an allvehicle class elevated expressway traversing the Caloocan Interchange, 5th Avenue/C3 Road in Caloocan City, passing through España and linking up with the Metro Manila Skyway Stage 3 at Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP), Sta. Mesa, Manila.

“We are currently working on the first five-kilometer section of the NLEX Connector from Grace Park, Caloocan City to España St., Sampaloc, Manila,” Bautista reported. “We need more than 1,500 workers to accelerate the construction.”

They are hiring OFWs on the advice of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) and

Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE).

“We are looking at our massive infrastructure projects as key employment generators,” stressed DPWH Secretary Mark A. Villar.

Already, the annual increase in the government's infrastructure budget generated 6.57 million jobs in the past four years.

The infrastructure will also hasten travel and perk up commerce.

The NLEX Connector, in particular, will slash travel time from NLEX to South Luzon Expressway from two hours to 20 minutes.

Add to that, it will improve accessibility for cargo trucks bound for the Manila Ports (North and South Harbor) and international airports, such as NAIA and Clark.