00:00Good day to you all.
00:03Now that Monterazas has formally presented its findings and put the science on record,
00:10I felt like it was the right time for me to speak personally.
00:15Like many of you, our family was deeply saddened by the devastation of Typhoon Tino,
00:20and we first want to express our sincerest condolences to everyone who has lost loved ones, homes, and livelihoods.
00:30That tragedy was real, and it deserves real answers, not speculation, not misinformation.
00:42When the accusations were made against the Monterazas project, our first instinct was to respond immediately.
00:50But we held back because we believed that the right thing to do was to let the proper investigations run
00:58its course,
00:59to let the science and evidence speak, rather than to add to all the noise and confusion.
01:07And that is why we chose to stay quiet.
01:12Throughout that time, our family endured a great deal of criticism.
01:19Some of it deeply hurtful, especially as parents, and we did our best to shield our boys from it.
01:31But we also know that what we experienced is nothing compared to the suffering of those who were directly affected
01:38by the flood.
01:40And we tried to never lose sight of that, and we waited for the truth.
01:43And now, that truth has come out.
01:48An independent study conducted by the University of the Philippines.
01:53These were done by scientists with no connection to the project, no stake in the project.
02:00They found that Monterazas did not cause or worsen the flooding.
02:07What caused it was the sheer volume of rain.
02:10Typhontino dumped over a month's worth of rainfall on Cebu in one single day.
02:16And that amount of water would have flooded those areas regardless of what was or was not built.
02:25But here's what the study also found.
02:29And this part, I want to share with you clearly.
02:34We did not just meet the required standards for water management.
02:40We almost doubled them.
02:43And because of that, our detention ponds caught and held back up to 99.74% of the excess rainwater
02:53coming off our site.
02:56Releasing it slowly instead of letting it all rush downhill all at once.
03:03The science does not just say we did not cause the flooding.
03:07It says that the systems we have built in place help reduce it.
03:13This is not our conclusion.
03:15It is theirs.
03:16And this study is public and anyone who wishes to go through it is free to do so.
03:23Several independent investigative bodies reviewed the same evidence and they have reached the same conclusion.
03:32So, we hope that all discussions moving forward are guided by this verified truth.
03:40We respect everyone's right to their own opinion.
03:44But we will not stay silent in the face of deliberate misinformation.
03:50And we will take all the necessary steps to protect our family from it.
03:58We understand that for some, no study or finding will ever be enough.
04:04Grief does not follow a timeline and we respect that.
04:09But what we are here to say is this.
04:13Cebu deserves real solutions.
04:16And real solutions can only come from correctly identifying the real cause.
04:26That is work that is ongoing and Monterazas is committed to being a part of it.
04:33I am committed to becoming a part of it.
04:40To our family, to our friends, and to everyone who has quietly stood by us throughout these past few months.
04:49Your support meant everything to us.
04:53Thank you very much.
05:07Thank you very much.
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