My thoughts on this.
[1] This is actually more of a local issue. This is an issue that directly affects the people within Metro Manila and some nearby towns and cities, not the entire archipelago. Sometimes, I ask myself why the news on our national televisions, radio stations, and newspapers are all about this issue when the rest of Philippines is not connected to it.
I beg to disagree, for water system it is for manila only but there's a bigger issue here which is the onerous contract.
This company is charging the government billions of money and with that, we are all involved as that money come from our taxes.
This involves the entire country in a sense because when it comes to public money it involves every single Filipino, even the unborn. But my point here is that your and my localities have their own water systems, contracts, prices, concessionaires, etc. We are not really involved in it. The onerous contract is the contract being entered into between MWSS and Manila Water and Maynilad. In which case, the issue is within their areas of operation which is Metro Manila and a few towns and cities outside. It does not involve the rest of Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. If the contract involved is with Dipolog City Water District, for example, the national media would certainly make little or no mention of it even if it also involves millions. Our
national media has the penchant to focus only on the news within and the surroundings of NCR.
[2] The contracts of the two concessionaires involved were signed in 1997 and, because of the recent cancellation, will end on 2022. There is not much to improve here because they are close to their end. There were onerous provisions but these provisions have been in effect for more than 20 years already. What is the point of changing them today when it is only a few years time before the contract will expire?
They applied for extension I guess but that's not the thing here.
The Ayalas and Pangilinans were accused by Duterte of economic sabotage and they can't do this alone, so there will be more corrupt officials that will be expose here, with the investigation by the congress all the involved in this disadvantageous contract should answer to the government accordingly and they need to be in jail if proven committed a criminal offense against the government.
The extension application was already approved during the time of Gloria. The contract should have to carry on until 2037. Thanks to our gutsy president it was cancelled.
Everyone should rot in jail, all of them. But then I seriously doubt a single person will ever spend a single night in jail because of this.