Marcos says PH had flood control master plan for decades: We're executing it now

President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. said the country has had a flood control master plan "for decades," but it is only that it is being implemented.

Marcos answered in the affirmative when asked if he was expecting a flood control master plan.

"We already have a masterplan. It’s just never been executed. We are only executing it now. We have had a masterplan for decades, but walang ginawa. Hanggang ngayon lang. Ngayon lang natin sinisimulan," Marcos said.

(We already have a master plan; it’s just never been executed. We’re only executing it now. We’ve had a master plan for decades. But nothing has been done until now; we’re just starting now.)

Marcos said this after inspecting the damaged Agana and Aquino bridges in Tarlac. The bridges collapsed amid flooding and heavy rain caused by the Southwest Monsoon or Habagat.

In a 24 Oras report from Mariz Umali, during a Senate session on Tuesday, senators questioned the lack of a uniform flood master plan.

“By 2015… it became a masterplan, and they were about to execute. Unfortunately there were elections in 2016 and the program I believe, was sidelined,” Senator Tito Sotto said.

Sotto said he hoped the Department of Public Works and Highways would bring it back.

The said project was from the administration of the late president Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino III, which included several basins: Pasig-Marikina River, Malabon-Tullahan, Meycauayan, South Parañaque-Las Piñas, and Laguna Lake.

That masterplan was funded by a $1.5 million technical grant from the World Bank with the goal of lessening floods.

Rodriguez, Rizal, which was included in the said masterplan, recently suffered severe floods. The plan would have included building a dam upstream at the Upper-Upper Marikina River.

Aside from the Aquino era plan, there was also a 1941 masterplan for the metropolis cited by Project NOAH executive director Mahar Lagmay that could have helped mitigate floods in Metro Manila.

Malacañang recently announced the plan to build five dams in Nueva Ecija and a 100-kilometer dike extending toward Pilar, Bataan, as part of the government’s long-term solutions to recurring flooding in Central Luzon.

The proposed projects were discussed during a situation briefing in Pampanga last week following widespread flooding in the region.

Palace Press Officer Claire Castro said the government is looking at immediate, medium-term and long-term measures to reduce the impact of flooding in Central Luzon.

Immediate measures include the repair of damaged infrastructure, as well as declogging, desilting, and dredging operations. The government will also continue monitoring these interventions to determine whether they remain effective and durable, Castro said.

At a budget hearing on the Department of Public Works and Highways' proposed budget of more than P643 billion for 2027, Secretary Vince Dizon said there was no national plan for flood control and drainage.

What the country has, according to Dizon, are flood control plans for all 18 of the country's major river basins. He said this was the recommendation of the DPWH's foreign partners. –NB/RF, GMA News