BY GLENDA SOLOGASTOA
ILOILO – Money makes the water flow!
This was the lesson that the Metro Iloilo Water District (MIWD) learned yesterday when it paid its bulk water supplier, Flo Water Resources Iloilo, Inc. the amount of P2.7 million in partial payment of its debt to the latter.
Flow Water responded by resuming the water flow to MIWD pipelines yesterday.
Flo Water had “disconnected” its supply Saturday morning over MIWD’s alleged failure to pay.
The MIWD Board, according to its chairman Dr. Danilo Encarnacion, had realigned the amount from its allotment as “guarantee payment” for bank loan.
“There is urgency in bringing back water supply,” he said.
He added that if they would only rely on their billing collections from concessionaires to pay Flo Water, their income would not be enough.
Encarnacion said they had also renegotiated with Flo Water the schedule of payment of the remaining arrears.
He insisted that MIWD had owed only P15 million to the said bulk water supplier, based on actual volume of delivered water.
As of yesterday, only a balance of P6 million had not yet been paid, Encarnacion said.
He also emphasized that installment payments to Flo Water had not stopped since January 3 when they (the reinstated Board of Directors) assumed office.
He blamed the previous MIWD administration for misappropriating more than P100-million of their savings./PN
