The Department of Environment and Natural Resources started dumping last week “white sand” on a portion of the Manila Bay beach, near the Baywalk strip along Roxas Boulevard, ostensibly as part of a “beach nourishment” program. That initial justification, however, has grown lamer by the day, as more details about the project emerge and more questions are raised by a bewildered public. There’s DENR Undersecretary Benny Antiporda’s hilarious defense that the “white sand”—crushed dolomite boulders imported from Cebu, it turned out—was a way to bring the Boracay experience to Metro Manila residents, and as a means to encourage Filipinos to better care for the environment: “Ilalapit natin sa kanila ’yung white sand.

Ersatz Boracay in Manila Bay. (2020, September 10). Philippine Daily Inquirer, p. A6.