Tiangco says Navotas flood-free, no thanks to DPWH

Navotas City officials boasted yesterday that other cities in northern Metro Manila may suffer from flooding but Navotas is nearly 75 percent flood-free and dares anyone to see it for themselves.

Navotas City Mayor Toby Tiangco told The STAR that he city government and residents accomplished this through the “Bombastik” program he launched in 2003 in Barangay Bangkulasi, then submerged in at least three feet of water.

“It used to be that areas that were flooded 165 days in one year. We have brought that down to only between three to 10 days,” he said, adding that the figures include the times the pumps broke down.

The program aims to reduce, if not completely eliminate, flooding in Navotas by strategically placed pumping stations along the Malabon-Navotas River using only locally-generated funds, he said.

Tiangco’s program has completed 19 pumping stations in 14 barangays around the city and the 20th is nearing completion. He said four more stations in Barangays Tanza and Tangos, are being readied.

Tiangco said the credit goes to residents and those who believed that they can solve the flooding problem on their own, “no thanks to the national government.”

He said the people of Navotas cannot wait for the Department of Public Works and Highways to finish the Camanava flood project by September 2009.

“We are determined to do it, to solve it on our own. We have proven that it can be done,” Tiangco said. “We have proven that, in fact, we can lessen the burden of the national government by doing what we did.”