ILOILO City – A six-month provisional water supply agreement brokered by Gov. Arthur Defensor Jr. and Mayor Jerry Treñas averted what would have been today’s start of water rationing here and in parts of the municipalities of Pavia, Santa Barbara and Leganes.
The 10-year supply agreement of bulk water supplier Flo Water Resources (Iloilo), Inc. with Metro Iloilo Water District (MIWD) ended at 11:59 p.m. yesterday, May 15, with Flo Water initially informing MIWD it was not renewing the contract after negotiations on the new pricing bogged down.
On Sunday Defensor and Treñas sat down with MIWD and Flo Water executives to avert a water supply shortage.
“The parties, in the presence of Governor Defensor and myself, agreed to an interim supply contract of six months,” Treñas told Panay News.
Within this six-month period, MIWD and Flo Water would continue haggling until they could come up with mutually acceptable terms, said Treñas.
In the interim supply agreement, both parties agreed to P21 per cubic meter as Flo Water’s selling price to MIWD, according to a report of DYFM Bombo Radyo Iloilo yesterday afternoon.
Flo Water and its partner, Iloilo Prime Water Ventures Corp., supply 30,000 cubic meters of water daily (20,000 by Flo Water and 10,000 by Prime Water) to Metro Pacific Iloilo Water’s (MPIW) 19,000 to 20,000 service connections in Pavia, Leganes and Iloilo City.
MPIW is the joint venture of MIWD and Metro Pacific Water for the operation, rehabilitation and maintenance of water distribution and wastewater management facilities of the water district.
Engineer Rob Cabiles, chief operating officer of MPIW, previously disclosed that Flo Water sought an increase in the price of water it delivers. It asked for P25 per cubic meter – more than double its current per cubic meter price of P11.72.
“We could not agree to such a price (P25 per cubic meter). Our customers will suffer for that very high price of water,” Cabiles had said./PN
