President Rodrigo Duterte said he rejected proposals of private companies to conduct massive land reclamation activities in Manila Bay because of corruption issues. Duterte said the processing of thousands of applications for reclamation projects in Manila Bay was stopped. “You know, for the planned reclamation in Manila Bay, thousands have applied. But because of the corruption that I heard early last year, there’s no more processing of papers. I had it stopped,” he said.

Manila Bay reclamation halted. (2021, June 27). Manila Standard, p. 2A.