Residents living near Angat Dam at Barangay San Lorenzo Hilltop in Norzagaray, Bulacan, are witnesses to the rapid drop in the level of the reservoir that supplies water to Metro Manila. (File photo by LYN RILLON / Philippine Daily Inquirer)
MANILA, Philippines — A separate agency, not one under the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), might be needed to ensure the proper management of the country’s water systems, Sen. Grace Poe said at the Kapihan sa Senado on Wednesday.
The DENR Water Resources Management Office, which President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. created through Executive Order No. 22, last March, was a welcome development, but it might not be enough to do the job, especially during this El Niño season, she said.
“We are thankful that there’s a move,” Poe said in Filipino. “But the very first thing they want to do with the executive order is to put the water department under them. There will be an undersecretary. But, if I’m not mistaken, what they should first is to study [the water situation].”
“So they will first create a management office to study this. But we can clearly see that what the MWSS [Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System] is doing is not enough,” she added.
According to Poe, there are at least 30 different national and local agencies managing the country’s water resources — all of them not operating in sync.
“As I understand this administration, they want to streamline things. They don’t want too many departments. But what many of our countrymen don’t know is that the management of the water supply is under 30 different agencies that are not coordinated… So we need to unit them,” she said.
“Kasi ‘di ba meron pang mga provincial, mga water regulatory boards, ‘yong MWSS pasesnya na pero parang inutil pagdating sa pag-aadminister lamang ng tubig, ito ‘yong kahit ano pang sabihin natin, talagang kulang ang tubig dahil hindi natin nade-develop ang inprastraktura para sa tubig,” she added.
“We have provincial, water regulatory boards. There’s the MWSS which, excuse me, is inutile when it comes to administering water resources. Whatever we may say, we really are short of water because we have not been developing the infrastructure for water.”
Poe has long been pushing for a separate water management department. Last April, she said that she was not dropping this proposal.
According to the senator, there must be something wrong with the Philippines, considering that Israel, which does not have as much rainfall yearly, has a better water system.
“It’s not just about how much we will be charged for the water we use but also about how we can find ways that will give us an adequate water supply. How many more dams do we have to build? Are deep wells the only solution?” she said.
“In other countries, like Israel, where it does not rain frequently, they have better water service. They even use a desalination process. In our country, there are reportedly 11 million people who have no access to clean water. And we are an archipelago. So obviously, there’s something wrong with the implementation.”