Environment Secretary Roy Cimatu told lawmakers during a hearing on his department’s 2020 budget the water supply in Metro Manila was now “stable.”
The DENR’s P25.59 billion proposed 2020 budget is 16 percent higher compared to P21.5 billion in 2019.
Tens of thousands in the capital’s east zone endured water rationing last summer as authorities acknowledged the lack of alternative sources while the supply at Angat Dam dwindled.
Cimatu said told the legislators the water level at Angat was at 183 meters. Authorities earlier placed the normal operating level there at 180 meters.
Meanwhile, a party-list solon and an environmental advocate urged President Rodrigo Duterte to crack a whip against two water concessionaires in Metro Manila for its failure to install wastewater treatment plants to stop the degradation of Manila Bay.
Buhay Party-list Rep. Lito Atienza and Environmental protection advocate, Commodore Robert “Bobby” Lim Joseph of the Manila Yacht Club, said the two water facilities now owe the government P1.4 billion in penalty for violating the Clean Water Act since 2009 to present.
The two water utilities failed to install and maintain wastewater treatment facilities in Metro Manila that should be connected to an available sewage system for proper wastewater treatment and disposal, Atienza said.
“The untreated water wastes from thousands of establishments and residential areas are directly being dumped into Manila Bay, making the once famous shoreline a big septic tank,” Joseph told the Manila Standard. Vito Barcelo
He said around 225,000 cubic meters of silt would be removed across the approximately 1.5-kilometer stretch of Manila Bay from the Manila Yacht Club breakwater to the US Embassy.
The Department of Public Works and Highways is currently conducting dredging of Manila Bay while the Metro Manila Development Authority is conducting cleanup and declogging of the tributaries and drainage canals in Manila City in coordination with other agencies such as the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Joseph said.
The environmentalist has also sought the help of President Rodrigo Duterte to remove dwellers in waterways in Metro Manila by transferring them in houses constructed by the National Housing Administration.
“With more 23 million residents daily defecating in Metro Manila that means 23-million pounds of human waste ending up in Manila Bay,” he said.
“Aside from untreated water waste, Manila Bay is the dumping of garbage of chemicals especially from hospitals and diseases thrown into the sea,” he said.
Both Atienza and Joseph called on the public to join hands in saving Manila Bay by doing their share through proper disposal of garbage and joining environment cleanup projects.