:00:02. > :00:08.Our World. This week we travelled to Manila, to explore whether some
:00:08. > :00:14.aspects of slum dwelling contained a key to urban living in the future.
:00:14. > :00:19.1 billion people live in slums. Some would like to clear them.
:00:19. > :00:22.was another 150 families here. Others say slums are vital to the
:00:22. > :00:31.modern city. And slum dwellers themselves have begun to set up
:00:31. > :00:34.their own agenda. We will fight if necessary. I am in the Philippines
:00:34. > :00:44.to ask a question unthinkable 100 years ago. Do we have to learn to
:00:44. > :01:00.
:01:00. > :01:10.live with slums? This is the rice belt of the
:01:10. > :01:14.
:01:14. > :01:24.Philippines. It is lush, calm, idyllic. But more than one million
:01:24. > :01:25.
:01:25. > :01:35.people per year are leaving it. Poverty, climate change and a
:01:35. > :01:37.
:01:37. > :01:47.population boom are pushing people off the land. The places they end
:01:47. > :01:57.
:01:57. > :02:04.up in look like this. Manila is the most densely populated city on
:02:04. > :02:14.earth. Half of its 16 million population live in slums. They want
:02:14. > :02:16.
:02:16. > :02:26.change. They always look down on us. They always refer to us as the
:02:26. > :02:36.
:02:36. > :02:46.eyesore of the society. This is the Estero de San Miguel. It is 600
:02:46. > :02:49.metres long. 600 families live on either side. Although it looks
:02:49. > :02:56.utterly temporary, it is decades old, and so is the poverty of those
:02:56. > :03:05.who live here. Mina, who has made her home in the slum, is about to
:03:05. > :03:10.show me how people survive here. Although I have been in places like
:03:10. > :03:20.this before, they were not the kind of places people actually lived in.
:03:20. > :03:24.
:03:24. > :03:30.It is like a mine. Yes. Just a tunnel, a dark tunnel. And people
:03:30. > :03:36.live in it. The tunnel, less than four feet wide is the centre of
:03:36. > :03:46.their world. This is the queue for the bathroom. This is the
:03:46. > :03:47.
:03:47. > :03:57.playground. This is the public space. And as for the private
:03:57. > :04:03.
:04:03. > :04:08.space... Hello? There is very little. So this is where you live?
:04:08. > :04:13.Three adults, a teenager and a child live here. It is clean but
:04:13. > :04:19.the sleeping arrangements are cramped. Would you sleep upstairs?
:04:19. > :04:24.We sleep down here. You sleep on the floor? Husband and wife sleep
:04:24. > :04:33.there. For some people, slums are one stage on the route out of
:04:33. > :04:38.poverty. Most people are trapped. 20 years. You have been here 20
:04:38. > :04:48.years in this house? Yes. And if nothing changes, the next
:04:48. > :05:00.
:05:01. > :05:04.generation will have 20 years of their own to look forward to. As I
:05:04. > :05:10.get further into the Estero de San Miguel, it is like seeing the worst
:05:10. > :05:17.of 18th-century Europe. Why does this survive alongside skyscrapers?
:05:18. > :05:20.That really is the question I am here to answer. When the Industrial
:05:20. > :05:24.Revolution led to places like this being cleared within a generation,
:05:24. > :05:34.why is it that globalisation seems content to try and just tinker with
:05:34. > :05:42.
:05:42. > :05:46.this? As I am about to learn, the answer is not simple. The 19th
:05:46. > :05:49.century city functioned better once the slums were cleared. Today,
:05:49. > :05:56.without slum dwellers, many cities in the developing world could not
:05:56. > :06:06.function at all. They are the ones to clean your house, drive your car,
:06:06. > :06:16.work in your garden, man your store. If these people leave the city, the
:06:16. > :06:20.
:06:21. > :06:24.city will die. The how hot does it get in summer? In a slum called
:06:24. > :06:29.Payatas, right next to a mountain of garbage, I come to meet Father
:06:29. > :06:33.Norberto. He has worked here 20 years and thinks the slums are
:06:33. > :06:38.important. In an age of scarce resources, there are lessons for
:06:38. > :06:43.all of us. You don't have to have more to be a human being. To really
:06:43. > :06:53.live. Because of the imbalance between having and not having been
:06:53. > :06:53.
:06:53. > :07:03.so vast, people help each other survive. Not only physically, but
:07:03. > :07:17.
:07:17. > :07:22.how do you manage your time, how do you manage yourself? Everywhere you
:07:22. > :07:32.go in Payatas, you see people organising things. Even a water
:07:32. > :07:38.
:07:38. > :07:47.fight has unwritten rules. They have had 20 years of doing for
:07:47. > :07:56.things for themselves, so it is an intensely social space. But by
:07:56. > :08:02.night, Payatas becomes edgy. The police here struggle to deal with
:08:03. > :08:07.prostitution, domestic violence and armed robbery. The Filipino
:08:07. > :08:15.government has decided to act. 500,000 slum dwellers are to be
:08:15. > :08:19.moved back to the countryside and these homes will be demolished.
:08:19. > :08:29.really can't live well if you smell sewage right? How can you live
:08:29. > :08:36.
:08:36. > :08:46.well? Attention! The day this water is clean, I will give you all ice-
:08:46. > :08:50.
:08:50. > :08:58.cream. Meet Gina Lopez. She is on a mission to clear Manila's water
:08:58. > :09:00.slums and bring the rivers back to life. Her charity, the River
:09:00. > :09:07.Warriors, recruits local people to clear slums, lay drains and patrol
:09:07. > :09:10.the place to maintain order. What will this pipe do? It will direct
:09:10. > :09:20.the effluent that would have gone into the creek into a sewage
:09:20. > :09:26.
:09:26. > :09:36.effluent plant. So there will be no more effluent in the creek? No more.
:09:36. > :09:37.
:09:37. > :09:41.And you cannot do that if people's homes come right to the edge?
:09:41. > :09:44.Security around Gina is tight because she is part of a powerful
:09:44. > :09:46.business family. They own the energy company, the main TV station,
:09:46. > :09:52.large chunks of downtown Manila. She takes a traditional view on
:09:52. > :09:57.slum clearance. There is a theory among some policymakers in the
:09:57. > :10:04.world that we have to just live with slums. We have to accept them.
:10:04. > :10:12.No, I don't agree with that at all. Why does anyone have to live like
:10:12. > :10:19.that? If anyone does, there is a web of lies. It brings down the
:10:19. > :10:23.rest of the community. I don't think any city can fulfil its
:10:23. > :10:31.potential if there are slums and people living like that. But there
:10:31. > :10:33.is a problem. The clearance is compulsory. While they are being
:10:33. > :10:42.cleared, some people are coming back because cities are where the
:10:42. > :10:46.jobs are. We are seeing a giant piece of social engineering. It is
:10:46. > :10:51.as if somebody came along with a big scalpel and cut away the homes
:10:51. > :11:01.of hundreds of people. The problem is not what is left because, it is
:11:01. > :11:05.
:11:05. > :11:09.getting greener. The problem is In Gina's helicopter and with the
:11:09. > :11:17.chief of staff, I am seeing the place the slum dwellers have been
:11:17. > :11:27.moved to. It is 30 minutes as the helicopter flies, but four hours by
:11:27. > :11:30.
:11:30. > :11:36.road. Here density is not a problem. The problem is there is no mains
:11:36. > :11:46.electricity, no prospect of ever getting any, and there are no jobs.
:11:46. > :11:55.
:11:55. > :12:05.The market traders have time to Ruben has been with us for some
:12:05. > :12:14.
:12:14. > :12:18.time. He has been with us for some Paul Mason from BBC. How are you?
:12:18. > :12:24.Well, thank you. I notice you have your name on your doorstep. That is
:12:24. > :12:30.you. Can I come in? Thank you. Ruben came here straight from the
:12:30. > :12:40.slum. He likes it, the house is bright and solid. But there is
:12:40. > :12:48.
:12:48. > :12:51.still a problem. Despite the problems the
:12:51. > :13:01.authorities in Manila are determined to clear 500,000 people
:13:01. > :13:03.
:13:03. > :13:06.back to the countryside. No minister has time to speak to me. I
:13:06. > :13:13.have managed to speak to the civil servant who runs the clearance
:13:13. > :13:17.policy. If we house all of them here it will cost 500 billion pesos,
:13:17. > :13:20.one-third of the government budget. That is not available right now.
:13:20. > :13:24.The government is trying to persuade people to resettle on the
:13:25. > :13:34.land. If they do not, the implication is clear. There are
:13:34. > :13:44.certain conditions... It is really non-negotiable. Then you will use
:13:44. > :13:46.
:13:46. > :13:51.force to get them out? We have a process for doing eviction. Under
:13:51. > :13:53.our urban development and housing act. There is a process for
:13:53. > :14:00.implementing evictions. That is something we need to follow by the
:14:00. > :14:05.law. But it involves force? It involves sending the police in and
:14:05. > :14:15.removing them? Yes. Next on the list for clearance is the slum I
:14:15. > :14:24.
:14:24. > :14:28.first visited. Mina has invited me It is amazing. We're on a bridge.
:14:28. > :14:36.It is about a yard wide. People have built their shanties on either
:14:36. > :14:43.side of this canal. It's only six feet wide in parts. I love the
:14:43. > :14:53.people in this place, but how on earth do they survive? This is the
:14:53. > :14:53.
:14:53. > :14:57.ability of the Filipinos to be adaptive. We are very adaptive.
:14:57. > :15:04.longer I stay in San Miguel, the longer my revulsion for the way
:15:04. > :15:08.people have to live gives way to my narration for how they do it. --
:15:08. > :15:12.admiration. Is that your bedroom? The tunnel itself is full of
:15:12. > :15:20.surprises. How is the shop going? How is business? Graduated from
:15:20. > :15:29.college? Which college? Technological Institute. What did
:15:29. > :15:37.you study? Business administration. This is doing my head in. I studied
:15:37. > :15:42.economics. I am talking to a business graduate who lives in this.
:15:42. > :15:52.Do you not find that strange? What do you say to the people who
:15:52. > :15:52.
:15:52. > :16:02.want to clear it out? They want to demolish us here. Please don't do
:16:02. > :16:05.
:16:05. > :16:09.that. The gist of it: We have invested all of our money here, we
:16:09. > :16:12.like it here, it is all we know. You have lived here since birth?
:16:12. > :16:22.Congratulations to you. Many people could not do this. Good luck with
:16:22. > :16:25.
:16:25. > :16:35.I am interested - these guys in the uniforms, who are they? They are
:16:35. > :16:41.the local police officers and councillors.They also live here.
:16:41. > :16:49.Who recruits them? Me. You recruit them? How many have you got? I have
:16:49. > :16:52.20 local police. And they have all got sticks? One of their main jobs
:16:52. > :17:02.is to protect the slum against arson. Places resisting demolition
:17:02. > :17:03.
:17:03. > :17:08.have a strange habit of being burned to the ground. This is water.
:17:08. > :17:18.I am in the middle of a three foot wide canal. What is this? It is a
:17:18. > :17:26.
:17:26. > :17:29.computer shop. A computer shop here? Yes, sir. I have got eight
:17:29. > :17:37.screens. Somebody is on Facebook, somebody is playing poker. Is
:17:37. > :17:44.anybody doing any homework from school? You are? HR... This lady is
:17:44. > :17:53.applying for a job. I'm gradually understanding how this settlement
:17:53. > :17:57.is liveable for people. Been the space of 100 metres, I've met three
:17:57. > :18:01.graduates, several candidates for the police force and the dot com
:18:01. > :18:04.revolution. With so much invested in this place, it is no wonder they
:18:04. > :18:08.do not want to leave. What would happen if they start to tear it
:18:08. > :18:14.down? We will barricade, we will fight. This is what we want. We
:18:14. > :18:24.will fight for our freedom. We will fight for our community. We will
:18:24. > :18:31.
:18:31. > :18:34.fight this one. We will fight if With demolition imminent, the slum
:18:34. > :18:40.dwellers are looking for answers and on these high-technology
:18:40. > :18:44.screens they think they may have found one. Zoning and formalised
:18:44. > :18:54.urban planning, it has fragmented our society We need to accept that,
:18:54. > :18:55.
:18:55. > :19:05.This is a world famous architect who has built skyscrapers, mosques
:19:05. > :19:08.
:19:08. > :19:18.Now he has come up with a rebuild solution for this slum. It is based
:19:18. > :19:19.
:19:19. > :19:24.on the way the squatters themselves This is the three-and-a-half metres
:19:24. > :19:27.set back... Even you are stealing a bit of space the same way as the
:19:27. > :19:37.slum dwellers? Yes, they have time sharing and location, location,
:19:37. > :19:39.
:19:39. > :19:44.location. They locate their place of residence near their place of
:19:44. > :19:52.work, near public schools for their children. We can learn from them.
:19:52. > :20:02.You live upstairs, you work downstairs. This is a pedestrian
:20:02. > :20:02.
:20:02. > :20:05.That is quite an optimistic vision compared to what it looks like now.
:20:05. > :20:08.Correct? The slum-dwellers support the
:20:08. > :20:14.scheme and the plans are ready but the government says it is too
:20:14. > :20:20.expensive. Would it not be better just to clear it, however painful
:20:20. > :20:30.it is for them? Would it not be better to clear it and then start
:20:30. > :20:31.
:20:31. > :20:38.again? You do not want to? It is uprooting them from the community.
:20:38. > :20:48.Also social problems. They are not assured of jobs. That is the
:20:48. > :20:53.
:20:53. > :21:01.approach, the fate of 6,000 people Long before dawn, the allyways
:21:01. > :21:11.People board the famous buses to begin the search for the $2 or $3
:21:11. > :21:14.
:21:14. > :21:17.We used to think these places would disappear as the world develops.
:21:17. > :21:24.Instead they have grown. Clearing them, even with the best