Damaged dam threatened Koronadal rice field

KORONADAL CITY
(Sept. 8/NDBC) – About 250 hectares of rice fields here and in South Cotabato
are threatened by the damaged portion of a huge irrigation dam in Barangay
Magsaysay.

Engr. Orlando
Tibang, officer in charge of National Irrigation Administration in Koronadal
City, said his office had already submitted to NIA central office a proposed
P50 million budget for the rehabilitation works of the dam.

Tibang blamed
the inundation of Magsaysay river bed due to quarrying activities. The dam was constructed in 1990.

He appealed to
the South Cotabato provincial government to stop quarry operations in Magsaysay
river.

But Seigfred
Flaviano, South Cotabato Provincial Environment and Management Office (PEMO)
officer in charge, denied Tibang’s claim that quarry operations triggered the
river inundation.

Just the same,
Flaviano, said his office has established a common quarry site in Koronadal
City to save other infrastructures downstream. (NDBC)