Pro-Filipino water deals loom

Concessionaires will exert all necessary efforts to comply with the directive of the President to execute a new water concession agreement after 2022

Daily ordeal Water users suffer the humiliation and the physical exertion just to access free-flowing water, the availability of which should be a basic right. ROMAN PROSPERO @tribunephl_RRP

Not only the removal of onerous provisions but water concession agreements that will be beneficial to the Filipino people would be pursued in renegotiating new contracts with Manila Water Company Inc. and Maynilad Water Services Inc.

Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) Administrator Emmanuel Salamat assured that the agency will be guided by President Rodrigo Duterte’s directive to come up with new water concession agreements with Manila Water and Maynilad.

“MWSS has been expressly directed to renegotiate the concession agreements with Manila Water and Maynilad in order to remove the illegal and onerous provisions of the same as determined by the Department of Justice, as well as to include such other provisions that are beneficial to the consumers and the entire nation,” Salamat said in a statement.

“MWSS and the Concessionaires will exert all necessary efforts to comply with the directive of the President to execute a new water concession agreement after 2022 which is currently being drafted by the DoJ,” he added.

Salamat also clarified that the MWSS Board only revoked the 15-year extension of the contracts of Maynilad and Manila Water from 2022 to 2037 — stressing that two companies still have valid and subsisting contracts up to 2022.

“This action of the Board did not result in the rescission or outright cancellation of the said contracts, which requires a separate and distinct act to be legally effective,” said Salamat.

“As such, the government, through the MWSS, is giving the two concessionaires the opportunity to renegotiate and agree on the new terms of the concession agreement,” he added.

Salamat, at the same time, cited the cooperation of Maynilad and Manila Water not only in expressly declaring that they would no longer collect or enforce the recent arbitral awards but also in their expressed willingness to renegotiate the inequitable provisions of the concession agreement.

A Singapore-based arbitration court had awarded P11 billion to Maynilad and Manila Water after favoring their separate claim suits filed against the government.

The recent decision by the Permanent Arbitration Court in Singapore ordering the government to indemnify Manila Water with P7.39 billion over its losses resulting from breach of obligations revived the President’s ire against the concessionaires.

The same court in September last year also awarded P3.4 billion to Maynilad on similar grounds.

Last July, Mr. Duterte lambasted the water firms for their failure to put up treatment plants despite collecting fees from the consumers for such service. He said officials of the companies could be charged with plunder.

Salamat, however. emphasized the importance of open and strong communication lines between the government and the stakeholders to ensure continuity in the public-private partnership (PPP) in the water sector.

“The continuity of the water sector PPP depends on strong communication channels and handholding engagement so that the basic access to water and wastewater services will not be jeopardized, which includes fully addressing and accomplishing the urgent call for new water and sewerage infrastructure projects,” Salamat said.

“MWSS is fully engaged in continuing to ensure the performance of its mandates under Republic Act 6234, as well as to achieve the purpose for, and the intention behind, the directives of the President,” he also said.