SCUTTLEBUTT

RSA’s PAREX hex

What does it take to nudge — or, in the case of San Miguel Corp., shove — a lucrative project stalled due to a conflict with an administration-backed initiative on a heritage area?

Make a lot of noise, which is what SMC president Ramon S. Ang is single-handedly doing.

Just last week, in an invective-spiked announcement, he offered to take on the flood problem, which is being linked to the conglomerate’s massive infrastructure developments such as the Metro Rail Transit 7, the Skyway 4 toll road projects, and the expansive and expensive Bulacan International Airport.

RSA said SMC would take care of the dredging and desilting of the waterways “at no cost to the government.”

The offer sounds generous to the point of altruism, but the reality is that it seems to be a gambit to get the ball rolling on the shelved P80 to P90 billion Pasig River Expressway (PAREX) project.

The cost would be fully funded by SMC under a Build-Operate-Transfer model, with no taxpayer or government money involved.

The proposed 19.37-kilometer, six-lane elevated toll road, intended to run along the Pasig River to alleviate Metro Manila’s traffic congestion, has been put on the back burner due to concerns about its environmental impact, heritage preservation, and potential exacerbation of flooding.

RSA had drummed up the project as a “solution within a solution,” claiming it would not only ease traffic but also complement a P2-billion, five-year Pasig River cleanup initiative to improve water flow and mitigate flooding. However, the leading SMC executive has abandoned PAREX.

RSA offered to clear clogged waterways, construct drainage systems, and relocate families living along rivers, with SMC funding land purchases for new housing and schools.

The PAREX initiative included plans to improve the Pasig River’s water flow, aligning with SMC’s broader Better Rivers PH program to remove silt and waste from Metro Manila’s waterways.

Ang’s 2025 flooding solution proposal appears to build on this existing cleanup framework, focusing on removing obstructions like waste and illegal structures along rivers, which was also a stated goal of the PAREX cleanup component.

Billions of pesos are being lost yearly through pork barrel projects involving flood mitigation, which RSA said he could undertake without any public spending.

The PAREX project is also being offered without the government shelling out a centavo.

The similarity of the bottom line of both offers is hard to ascribe to mere coincidence, as the P90 billion cost of PAREX makes it one of the most significant infrastructures in SMC’s basket of blue-chip projects.

RSA’s offer to solve the flooding problem was like asking the government: “Deal or no deal?” on PAREX.