Manila Water: P13B spent in 5 years not reimbursed by MWSS

MANILA, Philippines — Manila Water Co. Inc. on Wednesday said it had spent P13 billion over the past five years in its concession area in parts of Metro Manila and Rizal province, which the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) had yet to reimburse, countering allegations that the company had been recovering investments for unfinished projects.

“There has not been any five-year period when Manila Water collected more than it has spent,” the Ayala group subsidiary said in a statement. “Manila Water has always spent more than the amount of water rates it has collected from consumers, as determined by the MWSS.”

The P13 billion is on top of the P7.39 billion that an international arbitral panel awarded to Manila Water because the MWSS did not allow the company to increase rates in the five-year rate rebasing period that ended in 2018.

Manila Water officials said the company would no longer pursue the compensation. It also agreed not to proceed with the MWSS-approved water rate increases scheduled for Jan. 1.

Before Malacañang threatened to scrap the concession agreement, or its extension from 2022 to 2037, Manila Water said it had lined up investments totaling P115 billion over the next 18 years for its sewerage program alone.

‘Excess investment’

In September, Manila Water chief operating officer Abelardo Basilio said that since 1997 when the company took over the east zone, it had spent P38.5 billion on  wastewater programs from collections of only P36.9 billion, or an “excess investment” of P1.6 billion.

To complete its sewerage program until 2037, Maynilad needs to lay about 500 kilometers more of pipes on public and private roads.

“As a contractor of the MWSS under the concession agreement, Manila Water gets from the MWSS a fee consisting primarily of reimbursement for ‘operating, capital maintenance and investment expenditures’ that the MWSS determined to have been ‘efficiently and prudently incurred,’” the concessionaire said.

“This reimbursement of expenditures is not done on a daily basis [because doing that] would be so difficult, particularly as the MWSS pays Manila Water not with its owns funds but with the water rates collected from consumers in the east zone,” it added.

—Ronnel W. Domingo