THAT howling noise you might have noticed on Thursday and Friday this week was the nation’s collective expression of derision directed at the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) for its almost inconceivably stupid and wasteful idea to dress up the shore of Manila Bay with more than 500 tons of “white sand,” a move that is certain to go down in history as one of the more embarrassing follies of government planning.
Undersecretary Benny Antiporda, who may now be ruing being assigned the duty of serving as the agency’s point man on the project, tried to clarify the DENR’s thinking in a media statement on Thursday. The “white sand” is actually crushed dolomite flown to Manila from Cebu, Antiporda explained, and “was overlaid in the beach area for the people to see that the white sand will signify cleanliness.”
Continue reading with one of these options:
Ad-free access
P 80 per month
(billed annually at P 960)
- Unlimited ad-free access to website articles
- Limited offer: Subscribe today and get digital edition access for free (accessible with up to 3 devices)