Manila, Philippines – Aside from a number of items of hanging laundry, the primary two flooring of 65-year-old Veronica Castillo’s three-storey house are virtually empty.
“Our belongings are up high. We construct our homes upwards right here. Yearly the floods will scrape the ceilings of the second flooring,” Castillo instructed Al Jazeera, surveying her house in considered one of Marikina metropolis’s slums, among the many most flood-prone areas of Metro Manila.
However whereas the federal government is constructing a pumping station to deal with the issue simply 5 minutes away, development has been occurring so lengthy that Castillo wonders whether or not it should ever be completed. “It’s been eight years,” she stated.
Since taking workplace in 2022, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr has spent about half a trillion {dollars} to deal with persistent flooding from excessive climate within the Philippines. However regardless of the numerous spending, cities proceed to be inundated in a rustic that sometimes sees about 20 typhoons a yr.
Throughout a speech in July, Marcos Jr boasted about his administration finishing greater than 5,000 flood management initiatives, of which 656 have been in Metro Manila.
Days later, Tremendous Hurricane Gaemi deposited a month’s price of rain on the realm inside 24 hours, killing dozens and leaving elements of the sprawling metropolis submerged.
Earlier this month, it was adopted by Tropical Storm Yagi. Officers put the price of the harm at 4.7 billion Philippine pesos ($84.3m) with practically seven million individuals affected.
No less than a dozen extra typhoons are anticipated earlier than the tip of the yr.
The Philippines has topped the World Danger Index‘s listing of nations struggling to deal with pure hazards for 16 years in a row. In response to the worldwide engineering group GHD, floods and storms will value the nation $124bn by 2050.
Some analysts say the federal government’s method is failing.
“No quantity of engineering can fully management floods,” stated environmental geographer Timothy Cipriano from the scientist group AGHAM and the Philippine Regular College. “We’d be capable of management street-level flooding, however we’ve uncared for the overflow from rivers and coastal areas.”
Cipriano notes that Metro Manila and its 12 close by provinces are “one massive basin surrounded with the coasts on some sides and the mountains on the opposite plus the numerous man-made actions means floor runoffs shortly improve, and thus, rivers overflow.”
At the moment, the federal government has 9 “flagship” flood management initiatives within the pipeline. Every includes constructing concrete or “gray” infrastructure to empty or entice extra water.
At a public inquiry final August, the Division of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) chief, Manuel Bonoan, stated Marcos Jr’s accomplishments have been just for “rapid aid” and admitted many big-ticket initiatives had encountered delays.
Authorities information reveals that simply one of many smaller “flagship” initiatives was accomplished this yr, whereas the remaining have languished of their preparatory phases since at the least 2018.
This consists of the Metro Manila Flood Administration Venture, which goals to rehabilitate 36 pumping stations and construct 20 new ones by this yr. Regardless of a $415m World Financial institution mortgage, solely two stations have been rehabilitated and not one of the new ones have been accomplished.
The 60-kilometre (37-mile) Central Luzon-Pampanga floodway, meant to empty stormwater from Metro Manila, was supposed to start development in 2024. Nevertheless, final month, Bonoan conceded that delays had set the undertaking again by three years.
The DPWH additionally reported that 70 % of Metro Manila’s “antiquated drainage system” was clogged with garbage and silt, hampering flood administration. It additionally reported that the nation lacks a nationwide flood management grasp plan, with solely 18 scattered plans for main river basins that are “nonetheless being presently up to date”.
Perspective shift
Most flood management efforts steer stormwater west to Manila Bay or Laguna Lake within the southeast. Nevertheless, civil engineering knowledgeable Guillermo Tabios III says this method has been ineffective for a few years, and generally simply transfers flood dangers to coastal communities.
“We divert round 2,500 cubic metres of water to Laguna Lake,” he stated, including that water additionally means “a whole lot of the encircling cities will probably be submerged”.
Cipriano blames speedy urbanisation and close by quarrying for strangling Metro Manila’s 31 rivers and their tributaries.
Throughout Gaemi, Merjelda Toralba, 70, spent practically 24 hours on the roof of her makeshift creek-side house. She needed to tie a rope from her wood doorframe to a coconut tree to cease the rising present from carrying all the home downstream.
“The flooding is worse every year. And I’m extra afraid every time it rains arduous. In just some hours, I’d be trapped and the waters simply gained’t go away,” she instructed Al Jazeera.
Environmental and sanitation knowledgeable Jose Antonio Montalban of Professional-Individuals Engineers and Leaders (Propel) says a lot of the brand new infrastructure is expensive to keep up.
In Yagi’s heavy downpours, sections of the Molino Riverdrive Venture collapsed as floodwaters spilled onto the roads. Montalban blames unavoidable erosion to the cement and attainable substandard supplies, however “it was clearly over its most carrying capability. Now repairs will value taxpayers but once more”.
Montalban says what is required is a “holistic method” that considers “all components financial, ecological, hydrological and social. Sadly for us, rudimentary engineering purposes are the norm”.
Throughout Gaemi, the federal government admitted that 71 of the Metro Manila pumping stations have been unable to deal with the rainfall, which was greater than double the system’s 30mm/hour capability.
Cipriano says the authorities want to take a look at flood-prone areas as a “sponge metropolis. As an alternative of controlling water, you design areas to accommodate water. Make it much less of a concrete jungle, enable waters to seep or move with out constricting rivers.”
Huge spender
Since 2015, the Philippine authorities has allotted 1.14 trillion Philippine pesos ($20.3bn) for flood management, with 48 % of it in the course of the Marcos Jr administration.
Impartial public price range analyst Zy-za Nadine Suzara says possible “patronage politics” was concerned after noticing that flood management was usually a last-minute insertion by legislators into the nationwide spending plan.
Regardless of a scarcity of dialogue in regards to the designs and strategies to deal with floods, “instantly an enormous quantity of the flood management initiatives are added over the past week of price range laws”, she famous.
Congress has presently earmarked 779.38 billion Philippine pesos ($13.9bn) for the DPWH flood management efforts in 2025, roughly 12 % of the proposed nationwide price range.
Suzara says that flood management initiatives have at all times been thought-about corruption-prone as a result of they lack mechanisms for exterior monitoring and infrequently escape any rigorous scrutiny earlier than the price range is finalised.
She known as it a “waste of fiscal house. These funds may have been used for one thing with significantly better planning for local weather change adaptation”.
For 2025, the Marcos Jr administration has tagged 1.01 trillion Philippine pesos ($18.1bn) of the price range as “inexperienced spending” or Local weather Change Expenditures, a rise of 84 %. This features a local weather lump sum, which implies its particular use has not been recognized. The lump sum was multiple billion Philippine pesos greater than in 2024.
“Local weather change shouldn’t be used as an excuse to steal from the individuals’s coffers,” Congress Assistant Minority Chief Arlene Brosas instructed Al Jazeera.
Marcos Jr has acknowledged the taint of corruption and requested senators to look into the difficulty throughout final yr’s hurricane season.
Senator Joel Villanueva, a vocal advocate for higher flood administration, stated he’ll “file circumstances towards those that should be held liable”. To this point, no particular person has been prosecuted. Villanueva says he’s getting ready to sort out the matter once more in upcoming senate proceedings.
Brosas added: “The individuals deserve transparency and accountability in local weather expenditures. Funds should be channelled into official local weather adaptation programmes quite than into the pockets of corrupt officers.”
Colleges usually double as evacuation centres for communities affected by floods. Classes are postponed in order that dozens of households can take shelter within the lecture rooms, surviving on meals donations.
“It’s arduous, mendacity on moist mats in crowded rooms, wishing for higher climate,” stated Castillo, who rushes her 5 grandchildren to the closest evacuation centre each time there’s a danger of floods.
Ought to the federal government fail to repair the issue of flooding, residents like Castillo face the prospect of many extra years crowding into evacuation centres as they await the floodwaters to subside.
