WHEN THE rains come and waters rise, it is not just our streets that are submerged – it is the very dignity of our nation.
Every year, Filipinos wade through floods, their homes ruined, their livelihoods swept away. Yet behind this perennial tragedy is not merely nature’s wrath but the treachery of those in power: public officials who have made flood-control projects into their personal gold mines.
In schools, students would often worry about coming to school wet and having to cross ankle to waist-deep flood levels on campus. It has always been the same thing — that’s why we just get used to it. But apparently, we have funds – a lot of funds – to actually solve this. Apparently, the Philippines is not really poor. We’re just rich in corrupt leaders.
Recent exposés on the massive corruption in flood-control projects, from overpricing and substandard materials to ghost projects that exist only on paper—have ripped apart the veil of lies long peddled by government contractors and complicit bureaucrats.
The Commission on Audit (COA) has repeatedly flagged irregularities in these projects, yet the vicious cycle continues unchecked. Contractors collude with politicians to siphon off taxpayers’ money, while oversight agencies turn a blind eye.
The Department of Finance estimates that corruption in flood-control projects drained the Philippine economy of as much as ₱118.5 billion from 2023 to 2025, but Greenpeace warns the real cost could be at P1 trillion.
Greenpeace cited data from the National Integrated Climate Change Database and Information Exchange System that in 2025, the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) had P800 billion of climate-tagged projects.
During the 2025 State of the Nation Address of President Marcos Jr., he ordered an investigation into possible corruption in flood control projects, directing the DPWH to submit a list of projects done in the last three years.
Few months later, investigations exposed what would later be called the Discayas revelations: a web of collusion between DPWH officials, favored contractors, and political allies who had cornered flood-control projects across the country. Documents showed padded budgets, “ghost” dredging operations, and recycled contractors winning billions worth of bids despite glaring irregularities.
The COA confirmed long-standing suspicions, flagging projects that were either incomplete, substandard, or nonexistent. Rivers supposedly dredged were still clogged with silt, and drainage systems that cost billions collapsed after a single heavy rain.
While billions of pesos are poured into drainage systems and river dredging projects, ordinary citizens ask the most damning question: Where did the money go? The answer, all too familiar, is that it lined the pockets of thieves masquerading as public servants.
As a flood-prone University, we should be angry. Every downpour that submerges España, every class disrupted by knee-deep waters, every Thomasian forced to wade through floods on their way home is a living reminder of how corruption kills both time and future. The billions stolen from flood-control projects could have spared us from this recurring misery. Instead, they became mansions, luxury cars, campaign funds, and offshore bank accounts for officials who dare call themselves “public servants.”
We should be angry because this is not mere inefficiency—it is premeditated betrayal. Corrupt officials knew exactly what they were doing when they signed padded contracts, approved substandard projects, and turned their backs on accountability. They chose greed over service, comfort over duty, theft over life itself.
And what cuts even deeper is the revelation that three of those implicated in this grand plunder are our UST system alumni: former Senate majority leader Joel Villanueva and former House appropriations chair Zaldy Co, and Henry Alcantara.
This is more than shameful; it is a desecration of everything UST stands for.
If floodwaters continue to rise in our streets, it is not only because of clogged drains and swollen rivers. It is because corruption has drowned our institutions, our laws, our very sense of justice. And until these thieves in power are named, shamed, and punished, we Thomasians—and the entire Filipino people—will continue to pay the ultimate price.
The most soul-crushingly enraging thing about this situation is that these funds did not come from just a simple printer. It was—is—the Filipino people’s money. It came from the very sweat of workers who slave away for meager wages, from farmers who break their backs under the sun only to be neglected, from students who endure skyrocketing tuition and crumbling classrooms, from families who pay taxes on every grain of rice, every drop of fuel, every piece of bread.
These are our so-called leaders who campaigned for our rights, for our peace. But it was them, all along—a whole circle of shameless syndicates—who stole not only the people’s money but also their dignity, their hope, their very chance at safety and survival.
They masquerade as guardians of the nation, yet in truth they are leeches and parasites, sucking the lifeblood out of every honest taxpayer. They are not public servants; they are predators in power, wolves fattened by the hunger of the poor. Each peso they pocket is a coffin nail driven into the lives of families forced to rebuild again and again from the floods.
It is enraging beyond words: while children wade through filthy waters on their way to school, these officials sip wine in glittering halls; while ordinary workers lose everything to swollen rivers, they gamble our future away in smoke-filled rooms. This is not governance—it is organized plunder, treachery with a human face.
And we, the people, are expected to endure, to forget, to suffer in silence. But no—enough is enough. This is not mere negligence. This is criminal cruelty. This is betrayal of the nation’s soul.
