Water business attracted the conglomerates in the recent years. The Ayalas, the Manny Pangilinan group, the Villars, Ricky Razon and retail magnate Lucio Co among others.
The Villars are involved in many business activities. For a time former Senator Manny Villar was regarded as the brown billionaire landing in the Forbes’ list among the richest because he was in property development, retail business and the family in politics. He got interested in the water business and established PrimeWater Inc., the corporate vehicle that entered into joint venture with several water districts all over the country. It was during the time of then Angeles City Mayor Edgardo Pamintuan when negotiations for the joint venture agreement (JVA) was finalized.
Recently, PrimeWater’s JVs with several water districts wasn’t met with approval by some so the Villars decided to sell its interests to Lucio Co fronted by his Crystal Bridges water firm. To recall, the Angeles City Water District (ACWD) started in the early years as a section of the City Engineer’s Office. It morphed into a water district when the Local Water Utilities Administration law was passed in 1987. All LGUs water systems were mandated to be water districts and a law to protect and shield them from local politics PD198 was enacted.
From eight thousand connections in 1987 it grew up to 62,000 since the joint venture with PrimeWater came into effect. And just like any utility servicing a growing clientele problems can be expected. ‘Not even two percent of the total number of customers are received by the district’s complaint desk, according to ACWD General Manager Guy Lopez. Early on, when there was no JV yet, the district employees numbered to 212. Today what was left in the ACWD are only twelve regular workers and two casual employees. Many were hired by PrimeWater for its operations. PrimeWater is servicing 450 kilometers of ground laid pipes that starts from Barangay Capaya and cuts across several areas up to Barangay Sapangbato. It cannot be compared to other small service providers like Calsons, Teresa Waterworks, Taguete etc.
RETRO: In my younger years, I was a hired consultant by my cousin Kong Adiong Santos of Porac who originally owned Balibago Waterworks which operates water distribution in some parts of Angeles City. When he passed away, his two sons and daughter Vivian sold it to a group headed by Tito Panlilio, a banker and in his college years was a basketball player for Ateneo. Now this water system grew by leaps and bounds and has several branches in operation nationwide.
In 1993 the year when Republic Act 7227, otherwise known as the Bases Conversion Law went into effect, thus converting the former US military installation of Clark Air Base into a Clark Special Economic Zone, investors began coming in. Many years later,and today, there are now thousands of locators and counting. In the 4,240 more or less hectares of the fenced area of the freeport manufacturing companies mushroomed. Hotels,housing subdivisions,leisure estates, banks, schools,casinos, food chains, industrial park and golf courses. All of which consume on a 24 hour basis large volume of water.
In a study, it showed that Clark Freeport today consume more or less 80,000 cubic meters per day. And soon enough, the freeport including Angeles City and Mabalacat are biggest problem, water lack.Of course everyone knows that we pumped water from the ground. We really don't know how they measure the aquifer. If Clark and the adjacent communities with their respective water districts continuously pump water from the ground and retail to thousands of households and commercial establishments there will be a drying up to be expected.