Politicians, hands off

I must be one of the millions of our people who were delighted to know that the flood mitigation program which, according to former President Fidel V. Ramos, has long been in the pipeline will now be implemented with the full political and financial support of President Aquino.

We cannot afford to veer away from this program. Our people in Bataan, Pampanga, Bulacan, Laguna, Rizal, Cavite and Metro Manila have suffered long enough from the devastation caused by perennial floods.

The implementation of the program can only be ably handled by the managers and engineers who drafted it. Their program is based on the engineering and scientific studies they have made.

What I am worried about at this point is the big possibility that politicians might start messing up the program’s implementation for selfish reasons. This is a big-ticket program. We cannot allow petty and corrupt considerations to compromise the program or muddle the implementation of the various infrastructure projects under it. I suggest that, this early, the agreed/approved timetable for the program’s implementation, which are based on practical considerations, be published.

Likewise, the government must not lose its focus on this commitment; it should avoid entertaining—or being bothered by—suggestions that it set aside P100 million for site purchases and the construction of “water catchment ponds” instead of spending P352 billion for the program’s infrastructure projects, which some people think, based on their observation of the way their legislators treat public funds, would just open the floodgates to another binge of wasteful spending of the people’s money.

Let’s take note that 60-80 percent of the territory of the above-mentioned areas were inundated. Floodwaters in those places reached as high as three meters. The rest escaped flooding simply because they’re higher or elevated areas. Naturally, they cannot be used as catchment ponds.

The biggest question now is: Will Manila Bay be able to absorb the floodwaters, say, in the next three years or even after the flood mitigation program shall have been installed?

—APOLINAR MORAN,

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