SC asked: Protect nature, stop Manila Bay project

Can gleaming malls and condos rise side by side with mangrove forests?

Former Las Piñas Rep. Cynthia Villar yesterday asked the Supreme Court to stop a 635-ha reclamation project in Manila Bay which she said may impede the natural river flow in her city, destroy a natural habitat for migratory birds, and cause flooding in dozens of barangays.

Villar, who together with husband Sen. Manny Villar also runs a real estate development empire, is against the Three Island Reclamation and Development Project, which seeks to develop an upscale residential, commercial and tourism estate.

The proposed P14-billion project, which is being pursued by AllTech Contractors Inc., lies beside the protected mangroves, lagoons and ponds known as the Las Piñas-Parañaque Critical Habitat and Ecotourism Area.

Saying she enjoyed the support of some 300,000 Las Piñas residents, she filed a petition for a writ of Kalikasan, a legal remedy similar to a temporary restraining order, which was devised by the Supreme Court under then Chief Justice Reynato Puno to address complaints against environmental degradation.

Also named as respondents in the petition were the Philippine Reclamation Authority, Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and its Environmental Management Bureau (EMB), and the city government of Las Piñas.

“You’ve seen what happened in the places that were devastated by Typhoons ‘Sendong’ and ‘Pedring,’” Villar said in a press conference.

“This case is not just about saving the environment … about stopping progress … [or] about the proposed project’s economic value. It is about putting more value to people’s lives and protecting the right to clean environmental life of the present generation and of the unborn,” she said.

Villar said a portion of Manila Bay near Las Piñas drains two river systems crisscrossing the city—the Las Piñas and Zapote Rivers—which were the focus of the rehabilitation projects she pursued as a congresswoman for about a decade.

The reclamation project, she said, could impede the natural flow of the two rivers and cause flooding in 12 of the city’s 20 barangays.

“They cannot just come barging into our city and undo what we achieved,” Villar said. “Will they take care of us if we get flooded?”

To back up her argument, Villar said, she had commissioned the hydrology consultancy firm Tricore Solutions to assess the project’s impact on Las Piñas and nearby areas like Parañaque City and Bacoor, Cavite province.

Aside from villages in Las Piñas, 11 barangays in Parañaque and up to 34 barangays in Bacoor could experience flooding because of the reclamation project, according to the Tricore study. With Inquirer Research