JOSE A. CARILLO
In the uproar over the 12 evidently onerous provisions found in the water supply agreements signed in 1997 by the Philippine government with Maynilad Water Services Inc. and Manila Water Co. Inc., these two concessionaires both claimed it was the government itself that imposed those provisions. This doesn’t speak well of the entities involved, particularly the regulatory agency handling water supply privatization, fueling speculations of graft and prompting The Manila Times itself to editorialize that “the government should hire better lawyers moving forward.”