Fast action: Footbridge gets fixed after lawmakers fall into murky water
Leizel Lacastesantos , ABS-CBN News
Posted at Apr 27 2018 04:44 PM
ZAMBOANGA CITY - The local government unit immediately fixed a footbridge that sent lawmakers and local officials into murky waters when it collapsed Thursday.
The new footbridge was still made of wooden planks.
Officials were inspecting housing projects of the Zamboanga Roadmap to Recovery and Reconstruction program when the wooden footbridge collapsed.
Among the officials who fell into the water were Representative Albee Benitez, Mayor Beng Climaco Salazar, Rep. Celso Lobregat, national housing authority officials and their staff.
Lobregat said in an interview Friday that he was the first to fall and that other officials fell on top of him.
He sustained bruises and accidentally drank seawater but was thankful his injuries weren't life-threatening.
The residents of the barangay claimed they had repeatedly notified National Housing Authority about the substandard bridge but did not get any response.
In a Facebook post, Mayor Beng Climaco Salazar said that the incident truly showed the poor state of housing projects currently implemented by the National Housing Authority.
Climaco added it was time to "fully investigate the NHA in Zamboanga City, including its cohorts, the private contractors of the housing project.”