I have just spoken to Imelda and Bongbong over the telephone. It is only 4:00 PM in Rome—which means a six hour difference in time with Manila. They have seen the Holy Father and taken lunch after a normal flight with slight turbulence only over Cambodia (according to Bongbong the pilots told him this is normal).
We miss them both very badly. I tried to keep busy the whole day on the plans for an integrated flood control program. But the palace is silent and cold without them.
I am all alone in my bedroom now as I have allowed the two girls to go to the FGU for a drama presentation by the Manila Repertoire of “Flowers in the Garden” in which one of their drama classmates is appearing. But their mother is against encouraging them to get too close to the drama group. I suppose because of their outlandish habits. So I have sent for them. I hope the play is finished.
Met with Gov. Isidro Rodriguez of Rizal at the meeting of the Greater Manila Flood Control Committee and he seemed distant and reserved—apparently still smarting from the defeat in the hands of Gov. Tito Primicias in the fight for the chairmanship of the Governors’ League. Actually we sided with Gov. Rodriguez as I told my brother-in-law Kokoy [Benjamin] Romualdez but the wave for Gov. Primicias was too strong to be stemmed. But as the governor’s wife has said, the governor is still sulking
Official Gazette for September 5, 1970: President Marcos convened the Flood Control Committee with Secretary of Public Works and’ Communications Manuel B. Syquio as chairman, to thresh out details in the proposed funding of an integrated flood control program for the Greater Manila area.
At a meeting held at the National Disaster Control Center at Fort Aguinaldo, the Chief Executive emphasized that although he had consulted the leaders of Congress who had assured him passage of five urgent measures, he had placed the bill for funding a flood control program at the top of the list of bills he had certified to the third special session of Congress, which opens on September 7.
The committee which submitted their recommendations about two months ago, is composed of the Secretary of Public Works and Communications, as chairman; and the Director of Public Works, the chairman of the Laguna Development Authority, the city mayors of Manila, Quezon, Pasay and Caloocan; and the municipal mayors of Makati, Paranaque, San Juan and Mandaluyong, Rizal, as members.
The President directed the committee to prepare a similar program for Central Luzon, possibly tied with the plan for the Greater Manila area.. The plan should be submitted to Congress as soon as possible, he said.
Secretary of Finance Cesar E. A. Virata, on the other hand, sought for the revitalization of the National Waterworks and Sewerage Authority and the National Power Corporation so as to insure the success of the program.
The President directed the’ technical committee, to study the suggestions and to submit to him its recommendations. Present during the two-hour conference were Secretaries Syquio and Virata, Gov. Isidro Rodriguez of Rizal, City Mayors Antonio Villegas of Manila and Macario Asistio of Caloocan, Executive Secretary Alejandro Melchor, Jr., Assistant Executive Secretary Roberto V. Reyes. Public Works Director Alejandro Deleña, Mayor Florencio Bernabe of Parañaque and Vice Mayor Pablo Angeles of San Juan, Rizal.
(naghihinanakit). So I have invited him to see me tomorrow at 11:00 AM before I meet the leaders of Congress at 11:30 AM and the governors and congressional members for lunch.
We are going to spend P275 million over a period of fifteen years to be raised by the sale of bonds payable by the local governments thru the impostion of a 1/2 % real estate tax, for the Greater Manila Integrated Flood Control System. This includes a new flood-way for Mangahan at the upper part of Marikina River to the Laguna de Bay which in the flood of last Wednesday was four meters lower than Mangahan although it was only one meter lower in the 1943 flood; and a river wall on both sides of the Pasig averaging seven meters high, about 17 kilometers long (only six kilometers have been constructed at a cost of P16 million) and a series of pumps to pump the water out of the esteros and rivers into the Pasig River when necessary, as well as separate drainage systems and outlets for the different drainage districts.
But we must also attend to the Central Luzon flood control problem. We will do this next week. Dir. [Alejandro] Deleña says the level along the Pampanga River holds strong and there is no danger to it these days.