|
By Cris G. Odronia, Reporter
The Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) on Friday
appealed to residents living along the banks of Ibayo Creek in Parañaque
City (Metro Manila) to voluntarily vacate the area and give way to
the agency’s flood control project to ease the flooding in Sto. Niño
barangay (village) in the city.
The agency has blamed illegal structures
alongside the creek as the major cause of flooding in the area
during the recent heavy downpour along Sucat Road.
“Informal settlers living alongside danger
zones such as creeks, canals and rivers have no other choice but to
find other relocation sites for their own safety,” said Baltazar
Melgar, head of the agency’s Flood Control Management Service (FCMS).
Melgar, who has been coordinating with the local
officials of Parañaque to solve the flood problem in the area, said
these residents have been issued notices to voluntarily vacate their
shanties since last month. He said the clearing of the shanties
along the creek would free up the waterways and ease up flooding
along Sucat Road.
According to him, other families who would be
affected by the flood control project of the agency in the area have
started to voluntarily leave the creeks’ banks.
He said that widening of Ibayo Creek would ease
the flooding along Sucat Road since it would increase the
waterways’ capacity to carry huge volume of rainwater, especially
during rainy season. But, he said, the presence of the informal
settlers in the area makes the widening difficult to implement.
Melgar added that 25 families have decided to
avail of the P3,000 financial assistance provided by the MMDA in
coordination with the office of Sto. Niño Barangay Captain Ismael
de Leon.
Around 125 informal settlers have been found to
be squatting along the banks of the creek, disposing their garbage
directly in the waterways, thereby choking the flow of the water and
causing it to rise above the one-meter high railings of the Sto. Niño
Bridge.
Besides the widening of the creek, the agency
had also undertaken pipe-laying and improvement of the drainage
system along Sucat Road.
|
