Informal settlers in ‘esteros’ demand on-site housing program

Some 200 settlers, depicting fairies and other mythical creatures, gathered in front of the Pasig River Rehabilitation Commission (PRRC) office in Quezon City on Friday calling for the implementation of the proposal by Palafox Architects for the housing program along esteros Metro Manila waterways.

The settlers, led by Nagkakaisang Mamamayan ng Legarda President Felomina Cinco, demanded that the PRRC use the housing proposal along esteros designed by Palafox Architects, instead of relocating them to Calauan, Laguna.

“In today’s rally we portrayed a fairy land because we want the government to imagine and believe that our housing proposal is adoptable and could be the answer to housing problem of the country,” said Cinco, a resident of Estero de San Miguel.

“We want to show them that we are an important player in the city and that we can work together to clean the estuaries and waterways without throwing us to distant places,” she added.

For its part, housing rights advocate Urban Poor Associates (UPA) urged the PRRC to use comprehensive land and housing solutions.

The UPA also reiterated calls for the implementation of a three to four month moratorium on all evictions earlier promised by President Benigno Aquino 3rd during the campaign period through a signed covenant with the poor.

The group is hopeful that the PRRC would consider their housing proposal following assurance to residents that no demolition would take place while they hold consultations and discussions.

Still, estero residents expressed fear on the looming eviction of the 80,000 people living along the waterways, citing pronounced by Department of Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Ramon Paje, who plans to remove all shanties erected along the waterways.

Paje turned down the UPA’s proposal that the government should make use of the solution implemented in Bangkok Bang Bua Canal where about 3,400 families benefited from slum upgrading.

“We are cleaning the esteros without them telling us. I thought this administration will include us in the ‘change.’ But with the way the secretary responded to our call he seems to only think of the waterways and neglects the welfare of the urban poor living along the estero,” Cinco said.

According to UPA studies, slum upgrading in the esteros is possible and the government has no reason to turn down the proposal because there are so many commercial establishments encroaching on the estuaries.

UPA cited that in 2009 the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority demolished one hundred families living on the Estero de La Reina for the purpose of rehabilitating the estero.

But after a month, the 168 Mall extended its parking lot over the said estero.

“The Adopt an Estero program can be divisive among people of the city. But it is important to listen to the people and not be shortsighted. We have the responsibility to take care of the rivers but not at the expense of the people living along the estero,” UPA Project Director Alice Murphy said. –JAMES KONSTANTIN GALVEZ, Manila Times