Metro Water Woes: Key Questions Unanswered

THE WATER service interruption in the concession areas of Manila Water in East Metro Manila and Rizal has remained, causing untold inconvenience, even critical conditions, for households, hospitals, businesses and the delivery of basic services. In some areas in the last two weeks, residents had to line up on streets to await the delivery of water by fire trucks. The supply in some areas remains low, keeping these clients on intermittent water service.

With a dry spell already affecting several parts of the country, the agencies involved have not satisfied the questions raised by afflicted residents. Neither has media coverage reported in scope that will help consumers understand what caused the crisis and what can be done to bring them relief. While talk of El Niño and global warming have raised the specter of water shortage, the suddenness of this disruption warranted a more direct explanation.

The press reported fully the anger and frustration of the public. But much of media only managed to report statements issued by Manila Water and refer to the hearings in the House and Senate. TV aired in parts these events, including some of the press conferences of Manila Water. But media made only limited attempts to look into the issues, unable to explain what really caused the shortage, why there was little warning about its imminence, and what agencies responsible for the crisis failed to do.

CMFR monitored the three leading Manila broadsheets (Philippine Daily Inquirer, The Philippine Star, Manila Bulletin), four primetime news programs (ABS-CBN 2’s TV Patrol, GMA-7’s 24 Oras, TV5’s Aksyon and CNN Philippines’ News Night), and selected online news sites from March 7 to 24, 2019.

Visualizing the Problem

During the first week of the shortage, broadcast news relied heavily on footage of people lining up for water, in some instances showing clips of people arguing over the limited supply. Reporters visited affected residential areas and state-run hospitals, interviewing residents and patients about the lack of water.

Three sources of information dominated the coverage: Manila Water, Maynilad, the concessionaire that provides water for West Metro Manila, and the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS), the government agency regulating the two concessionaires.

Manila Water initially blamed the critical water level of La Mesa Dam due to the El Nino phenomenon for the dwindling supply. Rappler and Interaksyon questioned this claim, citing Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) meteorologist Rusy Abastillas who said that if El Niño were to blame, other dams should have experienced a decline in water levels as well. Rappler added that Angat Dam, which supplies 96% of Metro Manila’s water needs, still has a normal water level, and that La Mesa Dam is only a reserve in case the Angat Dam supply becomes too low. Unfortunately, most of the media did not include these questions in their coverage.

TV and online reports used graphics and simple animation to demonstrate the flow of water from water reservoirs to treatment plants and to consumers served by the two private distributors. News Night and Interaksyon provided more information through explainers on the bypass mechanism connecting Angat Dam directly to the Balara treatment plants.

Supply and Demand

Is it then a problem of supply?

Reports quoted Geodino Carpio, Manila Water COO, who said on March 11 that consumer demand has exceeded their Angat Dam allocation, moving away from blaming the El Nino phenomenon. Carpio also blamed delays in the completion of water infrastructure projects which the company had intended to prevent water shortage. In addition to the delayed activation of Manila Water’s treatment plant in Cardona, he said that MWSS did not approve other projects they had proposed.

The coverage that followed was largely a documentation of statements from MWSS officials, particularly from administrator Reynaldo Velasco, who said Manila Water has overdrawn from La Mesa; and chief regulator Patrick Ty, who said that proposed infrastructures as long-term solutions have been delayed partly by government and by oppositions from stakeholders.

At this point, the answers of concerned officials proved incoherent, as though they did not agree on all their points. Only a few reports referred to non-official sources that provided alternative views. The Inquirer cited Renato Constantino of the Institute of Climate and Sustainable Cities, who pointed to the lack of foresight among state agencies and bad governance as responsible. TV Patrol interviewed Ricardo Jalad, executive director of the National Disaster and Risk Reduction Management Council, who agreed that the water supply in Angat Dam is still sufficient, and the water service interruption is due to management problems.

Again, the media did not attempt a comprehensive analysis of the obvious mismanagement.

Need for Infrastructure

On March 13, Carlos Dominguez, Finance Secretary, asserted that the Duterte government was ready to solve the water crisis in the long-term as it had signed the China-funded New Centennial Water Source Project involving the construction of two dams in Rizal and Quezon, Laiban and Kaliwa.

On social media, the comment fueled the ire of netizens who accused the government of manufacturing the crisis to stop criticism of the dam projects and to accommodate China, as it has done for other ventures. In fact, these dams have been the subject of a special report in TV Patrol last November. Unfortunately, most news accounts seemed uninterested in following this lead.

Only the Inquirer (March 14) and 24 Oras (March 15) recalled the decades-long proposal for the dams, noting the shift of funding from private-public partnership during the Benigno Aquino III administration to a Chinese loan agreement signed during the state visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping last year. 24 Oras also interviewed environmental advocate Haribon, pointing out the environmental damage and internal displacement that would be caused by the dams’ construction.

It has taken the two-part report of the Inquirer‘s Daxim Lucas, published on March 23 and 24, to review in greater detail and with more context the gaps of infrastructure development through the different administrations, which could have addressed the challenge of climate and weather on the national water situation.

When media build up on earlier reports, the audience gets a better view of the larger picture and the complexity of development issues for which government needs to prepare.

Congressional Probes

The House of Representatives and the Senate conducted separate hearings on the water shortage on March 18 and 19. The tendency of the lawmakers to make political capital out of the issue was evident in the coverage. Media picked up such proposals as that of compelling Manila Water to refund customers, and some legislators’ call for MWSS officials to penalize Manila Water and to resign. These effectively sidelined the key issue the hearings should have addressed: assuring the public of an uninterrupted water supply.

24 Oras and TV Patrol pointed out a significant fact revealed during the Senate hearing: that the MWSS board has no civil engineer in it, and is mostly composed of lawyers. news.ABS-CBN.com published a follow-up on the board’s composition last March 21.

News Night briefly mentioned that the MWSS has no master plan for assuring a sustainable water supply for Metro Manila. Other reports did not raise these issues.

Rappler noted in a single report what measures have been done so far to augment the water supply, among them Manila Water’s sharing Maynilad’s surplus through a cross-border flow scheme. However, a News Night report said this measure may still take time before it benefits consumers. Since the facilities for cross-border flow have not been used for quite some time, the water passing through these still has to be tested.

Media’s Comprehensive View

If the public does not understand clearly the cause of the crisis, media must bear much of the blame. The different news organizations apparently refuse to refer to the discoveries and revelations made by other rival news organizations, and the result is a disjointed view of the issues involved in the crisis. 

The short-sightedness of politicians calling for heads to roll is something that makes news. But the resignation of officials of MWSS or Manila Water does not bring us any closer to a public appreciation of the short- and long-term aspects of water shortage. That failure can only be blamed on the media and its myopic view of news, reporting these as events rather than extended processes that can, without action, cause severe crisis.