A livid President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. lashed out at the contractor of a substandard river protection and flood mitigation structure in Calumpit, Bulacan, as he went on a site inspection of what he earlier revealed as 15 contractors cornering P100 billion worth of flood control projects in the past three years. cornering P100 billion worth of flood control projects in the past three years.

“What possible excuse do they have for not doing this? I can’t think of any. And then there’s this. All flood control includes dredging and desiltation. But what did they tell me? They have never seen desiltation here, not even once. That’s included in the contract,” the President said.

During his inspection, Marcos identified the project by contractor St. Timothy Construction Corp., which was listed among the top 15 contractors in his Monday presentation, for a river protection structure in Barangay Bulusan that appeared to be substandard. It also failed to carry out the desilting of the project.

Marcos sought an explanation from the company. He said the company had claimed in its report that the project had been completed.

Thin cement, poor workmanship

“We have pictures and we also have divers who dived down below, and they really saw that the cement is very thin. The workmanship is really poor. It will definitely give way, and it already has. That’s why they need to answer why this is the case,” he said.

Afterwards, Marcos went to Barangay Frances to inspect a flood mitigation structure built by Wawao Builders, another company on his contractors list. The project was valued at P77.1 million.

During Monday’s presentation, Marcos pointed out that Bulacan province had the most significant number of flood control projects with 668. The projects were worth some P6.5 billion, according to the government.

Bulacan, however, is not among the listed official flood-prone areas.

The President has encouraged the public to report irregularities in flood control projects through the sumbongsapangulo.ph website.

“The website is already up and many have already reported. Use that for flood control. Report it. Report it to me,” he said.

“This can’t be like this. Unbelievable,” he added.