Public Citizen | Energy Program | Energy Program - Philippines: Advocating for Water Over National Debt

“Bugsay, bugsay, kiling, kiling, dyutay!”[1] - Crossing the Waters to Drink

Water access for the people of Zaragosa Island, Badian, Cebu is synchronized with the ebb of tide. High tide, or taob, sees a group of mostly women and children paddle their baroto (a small, outrigger boat), loaded with plastic containers, towards the mainland to get water from the sima (spring). Low tide or hunas is not a time to fetch water, as it is difficult to approach or leave the mainland because the shallow water cannot accommodate the bottoms of the boats.

Approaching the sima, one can see the boats lined up, children bathing in the captured water of the sima, and women doing laundry. The drinking water is not taken from the sima directly but from one communal faucet provided by the municipal government of Badian, hence the line of boats.

The people of Zaragosa spend two hours per day to paddle their boats back and forth from the mainland and another considerable amount of time to wait for their turn to fill their containers with water. Most of the time consumed in gathering water is the productive time of women and children that could have been spent in other work, schooling, or play.

On Zaragosa, the municipal authorities have recently provided nine communal faucets, but the flow is minimal and one must collect water by a certain mandated schedule. A communal faucet provided by a five-star resort on one side of the island is no longer functional. Residents of Zaragosa still travel everyday to the sima for water.

Convenience is the primary reason why most residents of the island still prefer to get their water from the sima as they can conduct other business in the mainland like going to the market for household supplies or selling fresh fish caught the previous night. Bathing and laundry can also be done while waiting in line.

In another island province, the residents of Barangay Biton paddle toward the mainland to buy water at one peso per container. Those who do not own boats must buy their water from water peddlers at five pesos per container. Biton is an island barangay of the municipality of Taytay, Palawan. The trip to the mainland takes an hour by motorized boat and much longer by paddling. Biton has two islands, Icadanbanua and Calabadian, with a collective population of 1844 residents against one public well. [Photo 2. A child fills the container with water that will be later picked by the parents. This arrangement saves the adults considerable amount of time but means less play time for children.]

But this was not always the case. In the 1950’s, every sitio in Biton has access to communal wells. The water system, however, could not keep up with the migration to the area. From the late 1970’s to the 1990’s, Biton was the beneficiary of water supply projects (deep and shallow wells) implemented by the Department of Public Works and Highways. Most of the installed water systems, though, functioned only for a short period of time, the shortest being one week, before the well run dry.

Delivery of basic services like water is the function of the local government unit as mandated by the Local Government Code of the Philippines. Budget constraints and low prioritization for water service, however, compromise the access of the community to this precious resource. Hence, private donors and national government agencies still play a crucial role in the implementation of water supply services in the form of providing monetary as well as institutional support for organizing water user associations.

But the experience in Barangay Biton shows that institutional support for water system projects is low, especially for Level I systems (point of source, no distribution facility). Social and technical feasibility studies are also not employed for this type of project. The community is not informed how to properly operate and maintain the system, thus little technical problems can result in abandonment of the greater project and wasted money and opportunity.

The Zaragosa-Badian Island Multi-purpose Cooperative sees the need to improve the water system in the island to increase household access to water. The cooperative developed a proposal in 1999 and submitted it to Terre Des Hommes and Oxfam America for funding. Since the island is not blessed with a natural water source, the proposal seeks to build on the existing communal faucet provided by the municipal government by installing a pump and constructing a reservoir with water distribution to household clusters mainly by gravity. Tambuyog facilitated the proposal by including the necessary social preparation and technical feasibility study conducted with the Municipal Engineer’s Office and the Barangay Council.

The technical assessment showed that the communal faucet targeted as the source could not supply the demand of the households in the island. It became necessary, therefore, to pursue the option of connecting to the main reservoir in the mainland. Trouble started when the funding for the project came up. The mayor expressed his misgivings in a meeting with the Municipal Council. Multiple reasons were given: that the people do not have the capacity to manage the water system, that it is the municipal government’s responsibility to provide water, that the municipality’s water reservoir is still indebted to the World Bank and that the money could be used for other more productive purposes like an eco-tourism project.

It is worth noting that this is the same mayor who promised the islanders water in his maiden bid for the mayoral seat and swore he would not set foot on the island until he had delivered his promise. The mayor kept his promise as he has not set foot on the island nearing his third term, and the households in Zaragosa still have no water.

The community water supply, as planned by the cooperative, was not achieved and the money was returned to the respective donors. The mayor, in a feeble attempt to fulfill his promise and prove the cooperative wrong, hurriedly ordered the installation of 9 communal faucets on the island. Water flow is still minimal and the residents of the island still prefer to get water from the sima. In such a brazen display of power, the municipal government deprived the people of Zaragosa of improved access to water services, and in the end both the municipal government and the community ended up loosing.

Access to water is one of the themes discussed in the recently concluded National Rural Women’s Congress attended by 200 participants from rural women’s organizations across the country. The Congress called for increased access to water services for household water security in recognition that access to potable water is a human right. The government is called on to prioritize public spending on basic social services and not the national debt appropriation. The automatic debt appropriation policy of the government consumes 48 percent of the national budget, money that could have been spent to improve the Filipino people’s access to basic services, primarily water.

The Congress also called for the active participation of women in water supply development projects. Women, as the primary collectors of water, are currently not recognized stakeholders in water supply projects. Government water supply and sanitation programs either target existing organization in the community where female participation is typically marginalized or organize water user associations that seldom recognize the key role women play in household water management. Increased women’s participation in such project, with appropriate capability-building activities, is one way to ensure the sustainability of the operation of the water system because women are the usual users of such facilities.

[1] Bugsay, bugsay, kiling, kiling dyutay is a popular children’s song in the Visayas that literally means paddle, paddle, lean a little (to balance the boat).

Because Public Citizen does not accept funds from corporations, professional associations or government agencies, we can remain independent and follow the truth wherever it may lead. But that means we depend on the generosity of concerned citizens like you for the resources to fight on behalf of the public interest. If you would like to help us in our fight, click here.