Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) said it has “advanced” to the next step of the Certification Precondition (CP) process for the Free Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) for the P12-billion Kaliwa Dam.
This was after the conduct of memorandum of agreement (MOA) negotiations with the Indigenous Peoples (IPs) of Quezon Province, which was conducted from October 13 to 15, 2020, and with the IPs of Rizal Province, which was conducted from November 3 to 5, 2020.
The negotiations were done through the facilitation by the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples (NCIP).
During the negotiation, MWSS said authorized elders and tribal leaders, including their alternates, outlined the cooperation, collaboration, and obligations by the MWSS and the parties involved in implementing the Kaliwa Dam project in respect to the benefits, and livelihood projects of the indigenous peoples.
The Kaliwa Dam project, a joint venture of MWSS and China Energy Engineering Corporation (CEEC), involves the construction of a massive dam in Quezon and Rizal province that will have a capacity to treat as much as 600 million liters of water per day (mld).
The project will be constructed by CEEC through the Philippine government’s Official Development Assistance (ODA) deal with China.
Last year, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) issued the project its Environmental Compliance Certificate (ECC) but with many conditions.
Among the ECC conditions is the issuance of CP after the FPIC was obtained.
CP is an NCIP certification that declares that a project does not overlap with any ancestral domain area of any indigenous cultural community or indigenous peoples. That, or if the project already obtained an FPIC.
FPIC, on the other hand, is the consensus of all members of the IP communities in a particular project within their ancestral lands.
This is issued in accordance with IP’s respective customary laws and practices that is supposedly free from any external manipulation, interference, and coercion and obtained after fully disclosing the intent and scope of the project in a language and process understandable to the community.
The FPIC application process for Kaliwa Dam project started in 2018 followed by public hearings and community assemblies.
“The MWSS worked tirelessly to prepare and guide the IPs in making choices that include, but go beyond, choosing between saying yes or no to the project but also collectively choose the possible negotiated options that will be protective of their health, culture, religion, way of life,” MWSS said.
The agency said the negotiations for the agreement would have started right after the official consensus and decision-making process documentation by the NCIP, but the stay at home and travel restrictions due to the pandemic meant that physical meetings, which is inherent in community formal exchange of views were no longer possible.
“In this respect, the Kaliwa Dam Project team ensured that information is accessible so that the nature of the negotiation will be oriented towards mutually acceptable measures to which the IPs will have weighed their decisions on matters like compensation, land access, agreement making, and community development initiatives,” MWSS further said.
The last step to the FPIC process is the validation and signing of the MOA and the action from the NCIP.
In November, Center for Energy, Ecology, and Development (CEED) Executive Director Gerry Arances raised environmental concerns against the Kaliwa Dam, which is being pushed for by the Duterte Administration as the top solution to Metro Manila’s water woes.
According to him, the project will only “destroy ecosystems while displacing local communities”.
"The impacts Typhoon Ulysses left in its wake is catastrophic, yet it would have been worse if not for the protective barrier provided by the Sierra Madre which slightly weakened it,” Arances said.
“The onslaught of successive typhoons we experienced recently is a stark reminder of the dire state of our climate, and this must be noted above all in considering any project proposal,” he added.
Kaliwa Dam is considered as the government's long-term solution to the water woes in Metro Manila, which has long been dependent on the 53-year old Angat Dam.
Located in Bulacan, Angat Dam supplies 97 percent of Metro Manila's water needs.