"General Nakar, Quezon is an ideal new location for national government centers."
"General Nakar, Quezon is an ideal new location for national government centers."
Indonesia recently announced its intention to transfer its capital from Jakarta to the island of Borneo. Indonesia is not the first country to transfer its capital. Brazil transferred its capital from Rio de Janeiro to Brasilia in 1960 due to the steady growth of its population which cannot be sustained by its limited space. Nigeria, Myanmar, Bolivia, and Kazakhstan have also moved their respective capitals.
The city of Jakarta is situated on swampy land, with 13 rivers passing through it. With global warming and climate change, the city has been sinking and now sits below sea level. It is regarded as one of the fastest sinking cities, at an alarming average rate of 10 to 25 centimeters a year. This poses grave danger to its more than 10 million residents and threatens the safety of the various infrastructures built in the city, especially the government buildings. Since the capital is the center of trade, commerce, and governance, economic activities are also at risk.
Our country is in a similar situation to Jakarta. Experts have warned that Metro Manila is sinking at a rate of around 10 centimeters per year. Reports indicate that some areas in Metro Manila have sunk from 27-53 inches or nearly four and a half feet from 1979 to 2009—and continue to sink.
Like Jakarta, Metro Manila is also densely populated. Recent estimates peg the number of residents at 12.8 million. We also deal with heavy traffic congestion, which, while being addressed, will not significantly improve in the near future.
At present, our national government offices are distributed in various parts of Manila and Quezon City. The significant distance, compounded by the traffic and floods, hinders the smooth coordination between different agencies which consequently adds to the problem of bureaucratic red tape and delays processing time and release of government documents.
Hence, we need to transfer our government offices and establish a center of government where all national offices are in one area for convenience and efficiency. While the current plan is to transfer the capital to Clark, I have some reservations on this matter. Provinces north of Manila such as Pampanga and Bulacan are also said to be sinking by up to 6 centimeters every year since 2003. Pursuing Clark will end up in the same scenario as in Manila.
When I was in Congress, I proposed the relocation of the national government centers to General Nakar, Quezon and the construction of a circumferential road that will provide access to the new capital. The Pacific side offers spacious and unpolluted room for the central government.
We need to plan and build for the future. Moving the center of government to General Nakar will decongest traffic, ease overcrowding, and improve the conditions of the Metro that have been burdened with exponential growth which we did not plan for. We cannot be two minutes too late on this. We should move and start planning now. The deteriorating conditions of the Metro do not make for an ideal government center, and realistically, I see no improvement in our current situation. That said, let’s set our sights on areas with untapped potential.