Interior and Local Government Undersecretary Martin Diño, MMDA Chairman Danny Lim, Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno and MMDA General Manager Jose Garcia discuss ways on how to improve river ferry system. This was taken while the officials are on a bow of a ferry going to Plaza Mexico terminal in Intramuros, Manila. RYAN LEAGOGO / INQUIRER.net file photo
President Rodrigo Duterte admitted on Tuesday that the rehabilitation of the 25-kilometer Pasig river, which has long been considered to be biologically dead, would take “a generation.”
“It will take generation, another two or three presidents,” Duterte said in a Labor Day speech in Cebu City.
The President compared the rehabilitation of the filthy waterway to the development of Singapore.
“Ang Pasig parang Singapore: It took them 10 years under Lee Kuan Yew. Ten years to make it what is it now,” he said.
The 72-year-old chief executive narrated how he was being suffocated with the stinky smell of the Pasig river whenever he stays outside his room at the Bahay Pagbabago at night.
“Lahat ng germs na-inhale mo. Parang nagka-bad breath na ako [You can inhale all the germs. It was like I had a bad breath],” he said.
Malacañang ealier said that the proposal to institutionalize the Pasig River Ferry Convergence Program has been approved during the Cabinet meeting in April. /jpv
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