Covering an area of 1,994 sq. km., Manila Bay has a coastline of 190 km. but is quite shallow, with average depth of 17 m. (55.8 ft.) even as the deepest part is only 120 m. The bay is estimated to contain 28.9 billion cu. m. of water, but it used to supply up to 20% of the fish and shellfish consumed in the National Capital Region (NCR.)
The bay is lined by the mudflats and mangrove swamps of the delta of the Pampanga River, site of the most extensive commercial fishponds in the Philippines, and the marshes in Bulakan, Bulacan, where San Miguel Corp. (SMC) is building the so-called New Manila International Airport while Clark International Airport in Pampanga is underutilized.
SMC’s Ramon Ang wants a corporate enclave in Bulakan, Bulacan, where land is being reclaimed from the sea and hapless fishermen had to move out as fish had lost its refuge in the marshes. Once populated by anchovy and varieties of sardines and mackerel, Manila Bay no longer hosts more marine species, and reclamation projects in Navotas City, Manila, Pasay, Paranaque and Las Pinas City, Bacoor City in Cavite all conspired to rob fishermen of areas for their mussels and oysters.
In one forum at the Department of Agriculture (DA) years ago, Sen. Cynthia A. Villar muttered that the problem in the Philippines is “soil health” and not the scarcity of land as farms have been reclassified as commercial, residential and industrial rather than agricultural. If the country has more lands than needed, why are SMC and a platoon of commercial interests angling to slash each other’s throats to secure reclamation projects in the bay itself?
The Villar thesis doesn’t wash, and her opposition to one reclamation project in the Las Pinas City portion of the bay went for naught as it had been greenlit. As the Rolling Stones howled “you can’t always get what you want.” The Villar land banking juggernaut has gone on acquire vast landholdings, including those in Iloilo where an irrigation system still operates, mainly through joint ventures. But since even her colleagues are neck deep into some of these reclamation projects in collaboration with Chinese companies already sanctioned by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and other multilateral financial institutions, they will fight tooth-and-nail in pursuing these projects. Who says they care for national security? You can’ t eat national security. It doesn’t line pockets.
The resident geniuses of the House of Representatives and the Senate have championed these reclamation projects, perhaps all of them unsolicited, and gratuitously said they would hasten development of the bay and, to satiate the thirst of bleeding hearts, these reclamation projects could even have sections dedicated to mass housing. Would this mean that the people of Baseco would be relocated to the tony apartments with ample supply of gentle breeze and Favonian winds? Or the street dwellers and residents in bridge trestles and culverts would share the amenities of the high-rise condominiums usually owned by foreigners but registered in the name of their spouses or paramours. Americans recently made a huge dash to own residential units in these projects, beating the Chinese who have suddenly become scarce after the nasty POGO stories came out and the kidnap-for-ransom cases were finally exposed.
Manila Bay should not be regarded as a mere waterway that could be exploited to the hilt, never mind if the 20 or so reclamation projects had already compelled Sofitel to shut down as guests complained that the famed Manila Bay sunset had been stolen from them by the cranes, dredgers and boats that deliver silt, sand, soil, rocks and gravel to fill reclaimed land. They also forgot that the bay is a naval cemetery, with scores of warships, cargo vessels and patrol boats lying in Davy Jones’s locker in Manila Bay from 1898 to 1945. It was also the graveyard for 3,000 Chinese pirates led by Limahong who were annihilated by the Indios who comprised the assault units and wrecking crews of the Spanish forces in 1574, just three years after fortifications were built along the bay. That bit of history should be shared with China, which now has modern-day Limahongs here who possess Philippine passports as automatic Filipinos.
However, filthy lucre is more important than historical tidbits and the recurrent floods that would drown Metro Manila, Bulacan and Pampanga communities unless reclamation projects are banned in Manila Bay. The Philippine Reclamation Authority (PRA), which should be jealously guarding the bay and preventing its abuse, is going the whole hog to push more reclamation projects. Among the projects approved and pursued are the 360-hectare SM Prime Pasay City Reclamation and Development Project, the 265-hectare Pasay Harbor City Reclamation Project by Davao-based businessman Carlos “Charlie” Gonzalez and his Davao- based triple A contractor Ulticon Builders, the 318-hectare Waterfront Manila Premier Development Inc. Reclamation Project of Gatchalian, the 90-hectare Bacoor Reclamation Project, another 100-hectare project in Bacoor and still another 230-hectare project in the same city. All told, the total investment of these proponents would exceed P24-trillion. But what about the impact on fisherfolk? The floods? The missing anchovy, mackerel and shellfish that once thrived in the bay? You can’t eat reclaimed land.
