The Southwest Monsoon floods that submerged the NLEX, halted classes across Luzon, and brought down Tarlac’s Agana Bridge revived a question Filipinos ask after every big rain: does the government actually have a flood plan? President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. gave a blunt answer while inspecting the damage. We have one, he said, it was just never executed. Now his Public Works chief is tearing up the old playbook and starting over with science.
The plan that “was never executed”
Flood control master plans are nothing new. The Marcos administration has long pointed to flood plans dating back decades, including a 1941 master plan for Manila and a 1936 one for Cebu that were designed before modern climate change. The problem, by the government’s own admission, was never a lack of paper. It was that the plans were not funded or carried out.
After inspecting the Habagat-flooded areas that had halted classes and the collapsed Agana and Aquino bridges in Tarlac, President Marcos said officials were now focused on implementing and repairing flood control projects rather than assigning blame. Presidential Communications Office Undersecretary Claire Castro added that the government had updated plans for 16 of the 18 major river basins as of May 31, with the Cagayan and Pasig-Marikina-Laguna de Bay plans targeted for completion by the end of 2026.
What DPWH is doing differently
Public Works Secretary Vince Dizon has ordered the updating of all flood management master plans, and the shift is not cosmetic. Instead of one nationwide document, the department now applies a decentralized strategy, drafting localized master plans for each major river basin, on the logic that a solution that works in one watershed can fail in another.
The department is now working with UP-NOAH, the Asian Development Bank and JICA, plus local governments, to fold detailed hazard mapping, current climate projections and urban expansion into the plans before any project is built. As of September 2026, the DPWH reported this national picture across the basins it manages:
- 10 areas now in detailed engineering design.
- 6 basins with completed, updated master plans.
- 7 plans still being updated.
- 9 basins with projects already implemented or under way.
Under Dizon, a strict money gate now applies: no project enters the budget without a vetted master plan. Each submission must also carry an engineered design, feasibility study, and the endorsements of local and regional development councils. The change targets the old practice where projects were submitted with little more than a title and an arbitrary cost, which Dizon said allowed past abuses.
What is actually being built
Several basin programs show where the science-backed approach is headed. The table below summarizes the flagship plans as outlined by the DPWH.
| River basin | What is planned | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Pasig-Marikina-Laguna de Bay (Metro Manila) | Oplan Kontra Baha; Pasig-Marikina River Channel Improvement Phase IV; two flow-through dams, four retarding basins, underground retention and deep-well dredging on the San Juan River | Targeting a 60% reduction in flooding |
| Pampanga (Central Luzon) | 60-kilometer Central Luzon-Pampanga floodway with reinforced dikes | Long-term plan set since late 2022 |
| Cagayan | Five proposed flood control dams in Alimit, Siffu, Malig, Ilagan and Cagayan, plus river improvement and dredging at Magapit | Final localized framework targeted by end of 2026 |
In Metro Manila, the focus is on the Pasig-Marikina-Laguna de Bay corridor, where a comprehensive plan is being developed with JICA and the ADB alongside the ongoing channel works tied to the region’s repeated flooding.
Why the funding fight matters
Master plans only stop floods if they are built, and building needs money. The DPWH is asking for a bigger 2027 slice: a proposed P644 billion budget, up from its current P530.9 billion allocation, with about P107.4 billion earmarked for flood control management. Lawmakers are scrutinizing that spending even as investigations continue into past flood projects reported as completed but never found on the ground.
The same flood maps that satellites and AI produced for this week’s Habagat flooding are part of the hazard data now meant to guide where the concrete actually goes. Whether the new plans avoid the fate of the old ones depends on two things the government keeps repeating: funding and follow-through. As the President put it, the country already had a master plan. It was just never executed.
