Water hyacinths worsen flooding in Pampanga

CHOKED A backhoe loaded on a barge clears a waterway blocked with water hyacinths in Sto. Tomas town in Pampanga province. TONETTE T. OREJAS/INQUIRER CENTRAL LUZON

STO. TOMAS, Pampanga – Water hyacinths are choking all 41 rivers and creeks snaking through this town, slowing down the discharge of floodwater here and in the City of San Fernando where the provincial government, regional offices of government agencies and more than 100 banks are located.

In clearing Mapalad Creek in Barangay Sto. Rosario Pau here, the city government of San Fernando is lending the town a backhoe, ferried by a barge, while the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) has deployed a water master dredger. The creek drains to Barangay San Matias and to a tributary carved for a third river that exits toward southern Minalin and Macabebe towns before ending up at Manila Bay.

The water hyacinths are as tall as 0.91 meter (3 feet) and have obstructed the tributaries, stretching 25 to 30 kilometers and narrowing the channels by 40 to 60 meters, Sto. Tomas Mayor John Sambo said on Monday when he presented the problem to business leaders.

Dredging will proceed as soon as the plants were removed in a month, Sambo said.

The equipment arrived almost a week after the DPWH and the provincial and San Fernando governments agreed to help clear the waterways.

Sambo volunteered to oversee the operation and requested Antonio Molano, DPWH regional director in Central Luzon, to send the dredger to the town. The tributaries were last dredged in 2007.

Molano said dredging was also being conducted at the outfall (point of discharge between one body of water to another) of San Felipe River, which is connected to Mapalad Creek.

He said an expropriation case by the DPWH on private lands in the affected villages was under way to widen the water channel.

Vice Gov. Dennis Pineda said the provincial government would pull out a backhoe from Sapang Labuan, where it cleared a channel blocked by an ongoing bridge project. The water in Labuan drains the rivers of western San Fernando, Sto. Tomas, Minalin and Gugu that flow to Pasac River and then toward Manila Bay.

Sambo said clearing Sto. Tomas, a village of San Fernando until 1952, could ease flooding in the Pampanga capital.

Sto. Tomas belongs to the province’s fourth congressional district while San Fernando is part of the third district. Financially, the town is not as rich as the city, with a budget of P87 million this year.

The flood control budget in Barangay Sto. Rosario Pau will be available in 2017 when the Korean International Cooperation Agency funds the right-of-way land acquisition and the construction of a 6.7-km interchange of North Luzon Expressway, Sambo said.

Levy Laus, chair emeritus of the Pampanga Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PamCham), said his group would ask Public Works Secretary Mark Villar to institutionalize the yearly clearing of waterways in the province, where the 30 river systems of Pampanga River throughout Central Luzon drain before emptying into Manila Bay.

Sand spewed out by Mt. Pinatubo when it erupted 25 years ago continue to silt the rivers.

PamCham will also recommend the revival of the Pampanga River control system, Laus said.