Estero de Paco

The local newspapers are depressing things to read these days with their usual diet of almost daily murders of "whistleblowers", journalists, politicos and ordinary folk. Today we read that a woman breastfeeding her infant in her home was shot twice by some guy who burst in. The upcoming election campaign bullshit is prominent of course with the candidates doing their thing. One of the Presidential candidates was taken to task recently for passing out 20 peso notes to children in the poor area of Tondo.  Apparently there is some kind of rule against buying votes (ha!), but this guy claimed indignantly that he was doing no such thing. Instead he was providing funds for the children to eat kamote (sweet potato). Right. Doom and gloom also about the climate. Summer has come early, there has been no rain for some time and things are very dry. Stalks of corn are turning brown, crops are being ruined and fish farm water is evaporating, killing large numbers of fish stock. We are warned of "brown outs" coming as reservoirs are low.

It was a welcome relief this past weekend to see a good news story on some progress being made on the clean up of the Pasig River waterway. The esteros which drain into the Pasig are a mess. Squatters line the edges using the waters for toilets and garbage disposal. Industry and local markets with clogged drains dump their waste into them. From time to time driving through parts of the city you catch glimpses of these awful scenes, but where I travel, this is very rare, for me.

There are some groups of people - not led by government - who are seriously trying to make a difference and have created an ambitious seven year plan to save the Pasig. This is one of the stories of progress that has been made. A thousand families on the Estero de Paco have been moved to a resettlement area where they have been provided with proper accommodation and livelihood opportunities. The shanties have been torn down, eliminating a major source of the problem. The market is being renovated and the vendors and local neighbors are being educated in proper maintenance and waste disposal.

This Estero is one of hundreds that drain into the river so obviously there is a very long way to go. But it's good to see the beginnings of progress - on these bad news days.


The picture of the boys trawling for recyclable garbage is from Dennis Villegas, taken last year. These boys apparently did not go to school but spent their days scavenging to support the family. I hope they are now among those who have been moved to a better place. But there are still many more children and families in similar esteros, still to be cleaned up, throughout the city.