Vice President and presidential bet Leni Robredo slammed the camp of her opponent Ferdinand Marcos Jr. for accusing her of giving money to supporters.
“He is the one who has that record,” she stressed.
“Of all people, are we the ones to give money?” she asked.
She reacted to the allegation of the Marcos’ camp that “yellows” paid people to claim they got money to attend a Marcos rally, and that they supposedly “planted” people in a Marcos rally to tell the media that they were paid to be there.
“That is too much. Of all people, we are accused of giving money (when in fact they were the ones that have such record, and not us,” she said.
Robredo’s running-mate Senator Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan meanwhile said the rush to construct the Kaliwa Dam project across several provinces including Rizal should not brush aside laws and the rights of communities that will be affected.
He questioned the signing of the memorandum of agreement for the P12.2-billion Chinese-funded deal despite staunch opposition from the Dumagat-Remontado tribe occupying portions of the project site.
At stake in the dam project is not only the life and livelihood of the indigenous communities, but the environment and safety of communities living nearby, he said
The vice-presidential bet also reminded that the dam project will be under a loan agreement to be paid by every Filipino and with interest.
The 60-meter-high reservoir of the New Centennial Water Source-Kaliwa Dam Project will cover 291 hectares of the Kaliwa Watershed Forest Reserve and the adjoining ancestral domains of the Dumagat-Remontado communities in General Nakar, Quezon and Tanay, Rizal.
A 28-kilometer-long conveyance tunnel will be built from the dam site in Barangay Magsaysay in Infanta, Quezon through several barangays in Tanay, Baras, Morong and Teresa towns in Rizal.
Government data showed that 1,465 households in three villages in Rizal and Quezon will be affected by the China-backed dam project. Of the figure, 1,041 “will be at risk of flooding and other effects of possible dam failure or dam break.”
An earlier report said the MOA for the project was signed despite opposition by the indigenous communities.
Pangilinan said that with many controversies hounding its construction, a thorough and transparent review of the agreement is paramount