PUBLIC accountability is indispensable, especially when government infrastructure and public funds are involved. Questions must be asked, records must be examined, and agencies must explain their actions. But accusations of corruption require something more than suspicion. Before responsibility can fairly be assigned, we must first determine what the project actually was, who undertook it, which agency had jurisdiction, and who had the legal duty to secure whatever approvals were required.
That discipline is particularly important in the continuing discussion involving projects along the Taguig portion of Laguna de Bay. Much has been said about alleged reclamation, permits and irregularities. Yet the public record reveals several distinctions that deserve closer attention before conclusions are reached.
Whose projects were they?
Perhaps the most basic question is also the easiest to overlook. The questioned infrastructure works were undertaken as projects of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH). The records discussed in public hearings identify DPWH as the implementing agency or project proponent for the questioned lakeshore works. The same records refer to DPWH documents placing responsibility for regulatory compliance upon the project proponent.
This distinction matters because location does not determine project ownership or regulatory responsibility. A national government project constructed within Taguig does not automatically become a Taguig City project. One must separately determine who planned it, procured it, contracted it, implemented it and was legally responsible for obtaining the approvals applicable to it.
This does not establish fault on the part of DPWH. It simply identifies the proper starting point for determining responsibility.
Was it reclamation?
There is another question that should logically precede the question of whether an unauthorized reclamation occurred. Were the questioned works legally and technically reclamation in the first place?
The definition cited by the Philippine Reclamation Authority (PRA) describes reclamation as the deliberate conversion of foreshore land, submerged areas or bodies of water into land through filling or other means.
DPWH, however, has characterized the Laguna de Bay lakeshore works as components of major road and slope protection projects. Publicly cited statements from DPWH have distinguished those works from what had been described elsewhere as flood control projects
The proper response is not to automatically accept one label over another. The actual plans, engineering designs, original shoreline, construction methodology and purpose of the works should determine the classification. If land was deliberately created from lake waters, that fact has legal consequences. If the activity was principally road protection or another form of infrastructure, the precise regulatory consequences must likewise be determined from law.
Laguna de Bay has a special legal regime
The jurisdictional issue becomes even more important because Laguna de Bay is governed by a special statute.
Republic Act 4850 gives the Laguna Lake Development Authority (LLDA) substantial authority over the lake and surrounding region. It authorizes LLDA to reclaim portions of Laguna Lake and gives it exclusive jurisdiction to issue permits for the use of lake waters for projects or activities in or affecting the lake. The law likewise requires projects within the region that fall within its coverage to obtain LLDA clearance.
PRA, on the other hand, unquestionably possesses broad authority over reclamation projects nationwide. Executive Order 74 of 2019 delegated to the PRA governing board the president’s authority to approve reclamation projects.
The legal question, therefore, should not be oversimplified into whether PRA possesses reclamation powers. It clearly does. The more precise question is how that general authority operates alongside the special statutory powers Congress gave LLDA over Laguna de Bay.
That question has historical significance. The public hearings have referred to DOJ Opinion 106, Series of 1995, which interpreted the LLDA charter as a special law and recognized its jurisdiction over reclamation activities within Laguna de Bay notwithstanding the later creation of the Public Estates Authority, PRA’s predecessor.
Government practice also illustrates the special role of LLDA. Executive Order 202, involving the Laguna Lakeshore Expressway Dike Project, expressly recognized LLDA’s reclamation authority, designated DPWH as implementing agency and LLDA as cooperating agency, while also recognizing PRA’s participation.
Who had the duty to secure the approval?
Even assuming, for purposes of discussion, that the questioned works constituted reclamation and that PRA approval was required, another legal question remains.
“Who was required to obtain that approval?”
If DPWH was the project proponent and implementing agency, the permitting obligations ordinarily associated with the project must first be examined in relation to DPWH as proponent. This does not prejudge whether an approval was required, whether an omission occurred, or whether any agency acted improperly. Those questions depend upon the applicable law and the actual nature of the works.
What it does mean is that the absence of a permit cannot automatically be attributed to Taguig City merely because the infrastructure was physically located there.
Taguig may still have responsibilities involving zoning, local regulation, consultation or particular local permits. Those should likewise be examined fairly. But those are distinct from responsibility for securing national regulatory approval for a project undertaken by another government agency.
Accountability begins with precision
There may ultimately be legitimate findings concerning regulatory compliance, project implementation or government coordination. Those matters should be investigated wherever the evidence leads.
But different questions should not be collapsed into one accusation. A dispute over jurisdiction is not by itself corruption. A permitting issue does not automatically establish criminal wrongdoing. And the location of a national project does not automatically make the host city responsible for its implementation.
Before we ask who should be blamed, the law requires us to ask something more fundamental: Who undertook the project? What was the project legally? Which agency had jurisdiction? And upon whom did the law place the duty?
Proverbs 18:13 offers an appropriate reminder: “To answer before listening, that is folly and shame.”
Accountability is strengthened, not weakened, when judgment follows evidence.
