Costly Failures

When President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. visited Iloilo, he wasn’t just cutting ribbons. He was inspecting a landscape of failure.

On one hand, the skeletal frame of the PHP 802 million Aganan Flyover stands as a monument to paralysis; on the other, the city’s PHP 282 million flood control project is derided as “delayed at palpak.” These are monuments to a dual failure of execution and political accountability that punishes ordinary Ilonggos daily—in traffic, in rising floodwaters, and in lost faith.

The cost of these failures is paid every single day by the people. The Presidential Communications Office itself described the Aganan Flyover situation as a “malaking perwisyo sa trapiko.” For thousands of students, employees, and business owners traveling between Pavia and Iloilo City, this is a gross understatement. It’s hours lost in gridlock, fuel burned going nowhere, and deliveries delayed.

A 2019 study by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) estimated that traffic congestion in Metro Manila costs the economy PHP 3.5 billion a day. While Iloilo’s scale is different, the principle is the same: stalled infrastructure bleeds the local economy and steals time from families. For a small business owner waiting on supplies or a parent trying to get home, the halted flyover is a constant, expensive tax on their time.

Meanwhile, in riverside communities like Brgy. San Isidro in Jaro, the promise of safety has turned into a source of anxiety. Residents who were meant to be protected by the Iloilo River Flood Control Project now look at the incomplete, allegedly substandard walls with dread. During the torrential rains brought by weather systems like Typhoon Egay, residents reported that the flawed structures did little to mitigate—and in some cases, may have worsened—the flooding by altering water flow unpredictably.

The project’s suspension is blamed on “obstructions,” specifically the presence of informal settler families (ISFs). But these families are not mere obstructions; they are communities. Their presence points to a deeper failure in project planning—a lack of integrated relocation strategy by the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) and the local government. A project cannot be deemed successful if its foundation requires the displacement of vulnerable people without a clear, humane plan in place. The delay is not their fault; it is the consequence of poor foresight.

This immense human cost makes the political response—or lack thereof—all the more telling. Iloilo City’s leadership, particularly former mayor Jerry Treñas and his daughter Mayor Raisa Treñas-Chu, have been rightly vocal and unsparing in their criticism of the “palpak” flood control projects. They have publicly called out the DPWH and demanded accountability for the contractors responsible for the city’s flood woes. Their anger reflects their constituents’ frustration.

Yet, a conspicuous silence surrounds the Aganan Flyover, which connects Iloilo City to the Iloilo airport via the town of Pavia. Where is the same righteous indignation for this far more expensive, disruptive, and arguably more hazardous project? The flyover, constructed by International Builders Corporation (IBC), was halted not for simple delays, but for grave safety concerns over its structural integrity. An PHP802-million project built on a questionable foundation is a scandal of the highest order, yet the response has been one of deference and “patience.”

Why the tale of two projects? Why rage at a PHP282 million problem while being reserved about an PHP802 million fiasco?

Some may argue it’s a matter of jurisdiction, as the flyover is technically in Pavia. But this is a distinction without a difference for the thousands of residents, workers, and visitors of Iloilo City stuck in its traffic shadow. The city’s leaders have never been shy about weighing in on regional issues that affect their populace. Is the focus on the flood control project a calculated move to address a visible, city-centric problem while avoiding a more complex controversy? Is the same level of scrutiny being applied to all contractors, regardless of their project’s scale or their political connections?

President Marcos’s order to blacklist underperforming contractors is a necessary step. But accountability cannot end there. It must extend to the political sphere, where leaders must be held responsible not only for what they criticize but also for what they ignore. The people of Iloilo deserve more than stalled projects and selective outrage. They deserve infrastructure that works and leaders who will fight for their interests on all fronts—not just the convenient ones.