Watching Broken Roads, Broken Promises felt like a long-overdue confrontation, the kind you’ve been bracing for without realizing you’ve been holding your breath for years. It’s so uncomfortable to watch because I’ve realized that despite the struggles I have been going through as of late, it’s nothing compared to what people are going through. Like, ang kapal ng muka ko to even complain about a discomfort I was feeling, when other people are living in conditions that I can’t even begin to imagine. Like, I have some nerve, the audacity, when my struggle in comparison seems so petty. Insignificant.
If you’ve been following our blog for a while now, you know that O is the one who usually writes about things like these. I usually stick to writing about lifestyle because I can’t with the heavy stuff. But this one just resonated with me on a deeper level. It literally compelled me to write something.
The number of times I had to let out a huge sigh just so I wouldn’t cry is honestly ridiculous. Dingdong Dantes wasn’t just touring the country; he was dragging a spotlight across the exact cracks we’ve been tripping over for far too long. And frankly, it’s exhausting that a TV special has to do what entire agencies, budgets, and elected officials have repeatedly failed to accomplish.
But here we are.
The documentary lays out the problem with uncomfortable clarity.
You see roads that crumble faster than campaign promises, bridges that look one rainy season away from retirement, and flood-control projects that somehow manage to create more flooding than they prevent. Oh, the freaking irony.
It’s like watching a highlight reel of how corruption quietly sabotages everyday life EXCEPT there’s nothing quiet about the consequences.
What hit me hardest were the people who’ve simply learned to endure, because what else can they do?
Students trekking through mud, clinging to shaky makeshift bridges, or crossing a hanging bridge that is literally hanging on by a thread because someone signed off on a project that doesn’t even exist.
In the photo above, children cross this half-collapsed bridge just so they can cross the river to where their school is. Little children as young as 7. As a parent to a 7-year-old, I don’t even let her go on the slide by herself! I can’t even imagine letting her cross that bridge!
Families treating lake-deep water like a household inconvenience and trading in cars for boats just to reach work or school.
The little girl on the boat with her father grew up with the flood. She doesn’t even know a life where there is no flood. Let that sink in when you wish for rain because you’re feeling “too hot” or because you think coffee is better when it’s cold and rainy.
Entire communities are waiting years for solutions that should’ve taken months.
We’re told these are “delays”, “complications”, or “ongoing improvements”. Let’s call them what they are: FREAKING FAILURES.
PREVENTABLE. EXPENSIVE. INFURIATING FAILURES.
And honestly? I’m done being polite about it.
Bad governance isn’t just an abstract civic issue, IT’S A THIEF. It steals safety, opportunity, time, and dignity.
When a flood-control project turns out to be overpriced, underbuilt, or flat-out pointless, that’s not a minor technical error.
It’s a direct attack on the people who paid for it and the communities depending on it.
So yes, I want accountability.
REAL accountability. I WANT TO SEE HEADS ROLLING, BLOOD DRAWN! Ang OA, pero true, we deserve nothing less!
The kind with actual consequences. The kind that makes people in power feel the weight of what they’ve done, or failed to do.
I want heads rolling. I want to see blood drawn in the form of real legal repercussions, not symbolic wrist-slaps.
❌Not another committee hearing where everyone suddenly develops amnesia.
❌Not another round of finger-pointing designed to confuse the public.
❌Not another neatly worded statement about “investigations” that quietly die in the background.
If these projects show signs of corruption, and the documentary, multiple news stories strongly suggest they do, then someone needs to face consequences that actually mean something.
And if the evidence points to criminal wrongdoing, then let’s👏🏻 stop👏🏻 tiptoeing👏🏻 around it. Somebody should at the very least end up behind bars.
Because every year we let this cycle repeat, the same communities continue to sink, literally and figuratively.
We cannot keep normalizing incompetence dressed up as progress just because we’re not the ones wading through floodwater at 5 a.m.!
We cannot keep pretending that billions of pesos can vanish without a single person being held responsible.
And we absolutely cannot keep applauding ribbon-cuttings for infrastructure that collapses the moment the cameras leave.
Broken Roads, Broken Promises forced me to stop looking away. It pushed me to make noise, to use my voice in the only way I can, by refusing to let this be another “shame, but what can we do?” moment.
This documentary forces the issue back onto the table where it belongs, and it forces those in power to feel the pressure they’ve been dodging for decades.
Broken Roads, Broken promises did its job, so freaking well! Shining light, exposing truth, and demanding better.
Now it’s our turn to demand the follow-through! The investigations, the transparency, the accountability, and yes, the justice that’s been overdue for far too long.
Because broken roads are one thing. Broken promises? We’ve had enough of those.
Catch Broken Roads, Broken Promises streaming on YouTube via the GMA Public Affairs channel.
