Marikina eyes raps vs lawmaker’s firm

MANILA, Philippines — The Marikina government is considering filing an administrative complaint before the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) against BF Corp. for a reclamation project along the Marikina River, which is believed to be among the causes of the massive flooding in the city.

Mayor Marcelino Teodoro said BF Corp., the company owned by Marikina Rep. Bayani Fernando, did not secure an environmental compliance certificate (ECC) for the project.

“We are thinking of filing an administrative complaint with the DENR. It’s the DENR which has jurisdiction over the area because it’s a river easement,” he said in an interview with “The Chiefs” on Cignal TV’s OneNews/TV5 on Thursday night.

Teodoro said the reclamation project – located on the side of Provident Village in Barangay Tanong, one of the areas hardest-hit by floodwaters brought by Typhoon Ulysses – does not have an environmental impact assessment report, a requirement for the issuance of an ECC.

Teodoro believes the project is one of the reasons for the flooding as it reduced the width of the 100-meter-wide river by about 20 meters.

“Nagkaroon ng bottleneck kaya ‘yung velocity of the water current ay nag-decrease by one meter per second in that area,” Teodoro said.

DENR Undersecretary for policy, planning and international affairs Jonas Leones said they will look into Teodoro’s concerns.

“If the good mayor claims may reclamation in the area, siguro mga 80 to 90 percent doon are illegal reclamations,” Leones said in the same interview.

But Leones also said the reduction of the river’s width may have been caused by “accretion” as a result of siltation.

“One way of really addressing, although not 100 percent, is we can dredge the river system,” he said.

Teodoro said they initially thought the reclamation is a project of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) based on the trucks they caught dumping soil in the river.

However, DPWH officials whom Teodoro asked denied it was a project of the department. He clarified they did not issue a permit for the reclamation project.

Teodoro said it might take them over a month to clear the city of mud and debris brought by the typhoon.

Based on their inventory, Teodoro said at least 349 major roads and 101 kilometers of secondary roads have yet to be cleared.

“We could manage to clear everything from 30 to 45 given the resources that we have,” he said. – Rhodina Villanueva