By Jonathan L. Mayuga & Jovee Marie N. dela Cruz
ENVIRONMENT Secretary Roy A. Cimatu has ordered the suspension of all quarrying operations in Rizal province following the massive flooding brought about by nonstop rain over the past few days.
Cimatu issued the order upon the instruction of Special Assistant to the President, Christopher Lawrence T. “Bong” Go, who visited Marikina City, one of the severely affected areas in Metro Manila.
Marikina City went under water as the Marikina River overflowed —something that experts had blamed on the extensive damage around the Marikina watershed.
In 2009 Tropical Storm Ondoy (international name Ketsana) inundated many parts of Metro Manila. The flood that severely affected Marikina City and other parts of Rizal and Metro Manila was attributed to the overflowing of the river.
More than 700 people were killed by that flooding, which prompted the declaration of the Marikina watershed, a Protected Area in 2012 called Upper Marikina River Basin Protected Landscape (UMRBPL).
Quarrying, an open-pit mining method, shaves forests to extract boulders of rock, which are crushed to produce gravel. The number of quarrying operations in the entire province, which partly covers the UMRBPL, is not immediately known.
Upper Marikina River, the area officially referred to as Protected Landscape, covers a total of 26,125.64 hectares covering the upper reaches of the Marikina watershed in the Province of Rizal, flowing through the Antipolo, Baras, Rodriguez, San Mateo and Tanay towns.
In Rodriguez town, the river is dammed by Wawa Dam, a structure built during the early-1900s to provide water for Manila.
Aside from Marikina City, the Municipality of Taytay was also severely affected by flash floods.
In a statement released by the DENR, Go was quoted as saying that he will ask the DENR to investigate whether the flooding was indeed triggered by the unchecked quarrying operations in the province.
Go then spoke with Cimatu, who responded by suspending quarrying operations in Rizal, particularly in San Mateo and Rodriguez.
DENR Undersecretary for Mining Concerns Ana Liza R. Teh instructed Mines and Geosciences Bureau Regional Director Samuel Paragas to coordinate with Environmental Management Bureau Regional Director Noemi Paranada and EMB Director Engr. Metodio Turbella in issuing a joint Stoppage Order on the quarrying and crushing of plants in San Mateo and Rodriguez, Rizal
Flood fund
THE chairman of the House Committee on Metro Manila Development on Monday asked the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) and Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) to report to Congress the status of the P25-billion Metro Manila Flood Control Management Project, which would have mitigated the incidents of massive flooding in the capital.
Quezon City Rep. Winston Castelo, the panel chairman, made a statement after huge parts of Metro Manila were again inundated by the continuous downpour during the weekend, spawned by a tropical storm and the southwest monsoon.
“Where is the anti-flood project?” Castelo asked the DPWH and MMDA. “I am now wondering what is taking the DPWH and the MMDA too long to even bid out the project, which is an obvious priority. Is it incompetence or pure insensitivity?” Castelo added.
The project, which received funding from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the World Bank, has been ready since the start of the year.
Castelo said he had called for these agencies to give priority to the project, with an eye to completing it before the onset of the rainy season.
“Several monsoon rains or habagat after, which placed Metro Manila residents in danger and the Metro Manila economy in a temporary standstill, there is no progress in the crucial project,” Castelo said.
The lawmaker said the two agencies should carry out their mandate of mitigating the residents’ ordeal from floods by speeding up the bidding for the projects intended to reduce flooding.
Castelo said the slow action from the agencies may spur calls for the grant by Congress of emergency powers for the President to solve the flooding crisis. He, however, said government agencies should not wait for the President to step in.