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The 36-year-old has grown resigned to inundation as a way of life.

This teacher takes a small vessel through inundated streets on a regular basis. This is the only way to travel from her home in the residential area to the main part of a low-lying town near the Philippine capital.

This vessel takes her to her job, and to the medical facility where she is being treated for a serious illness. She says she only sees dry streets for about two months in the year.

Yet now she is very angry.

An extreme monsoon has upended daily life to a greater extent in this island country, and provoked outrage and allegations about graft in public works.

Heavy precipitation have left stuck many residents while traveling, submerged automobiles in roads that have turned into rivers and led to outbreaks of a bacterial infection, an illness affecting the liver that spreads through the waste of pests.

"I feel betrayed," she says. "I put in effort, I save carefully and deductions are withheld from my salary every month. Then I learn that huge amounts in our taxes are used personally by unscrupulous leaders."

This accusation striking a chord across the Philippines, where people are questioning why the government cannot control the inundation with the significant funding of currency it invests in infrastructure like roads, viaducts and levees.

Their anger is noticeable on TikTok, Facebook and microblogging sites, where they are voicing about lawmakers and industry leaders who they assert win contracts for nonexistent projects that never materialise.

President Ferdinand Bongbong Marcos publicly recognized this as a ongoing issue on a visit to inspect a water management structure that he then discovered did not exist. The economic planning minister later said graft had claimed a significant portion of taxpayer resources allotted for infrastructure.

The House Speaker, who has been implicated, has stepped down, although he disputes any misconduct. Additionally the figure of the upper house has been ousted after it was found that a contractor who won a government bid was revealed to have contributed money to his political run, which is against the law.

Angry Filipinos have been stitching together AI videos of politicians as symbols of greed, a emblem of avarice. Much the anger is also aimed at nepotism beneficiaries, the offspring of wealthy politicians or contractors, whose lavish lives are prominent on social media.

Browsing through her feeds, Ms Tolentino says she connects deeply with a piece of music from over a decade ago which has become the soundtrack to the public fury.

Upuan, by Filipino musician Gloc-9, asks why leaders are fail to empathise with everyday citizens. The title means chair in Filipino, and it captures the resentment at those with government positions who seem far removed from the lives of everyday Filipinos.

"That song is exactly what we face," the resident says. "It sums it up."

A major integrity protest is already set for Sunday, 21 September—the observance of the day in the past when the dictator Ferdinand Marcos declared authoritarian control.

The current president, who is now in power—Bongbong Marcos—is well aware of how far popular outrage can go. In fact, anti-corruption protests that drove his father from power in that year, ending a prolonged dictatorship that embezzled billions from the state.

Lately, activism forced governmental adjustments in Indonesia and, just last week, overthrew the government in Nepal. Therefore on Monday, as Filipinos called for an explanation, President Marcos Jr announced an probe that would "expose the fraudsters and find out how much they stole."

"Without this role, I might be out on the streets with them," he told reporters.

"Let them know how much they hurt you, how they stole from you. Tell them, express your anger, demonstrate—just make it peaceful."

He repeated prior remarks when he promised improved conditions while appearing to pin the responsibility elsewhere. He blamed dishonest officials and constructions firms for the inadequate state of infrastructure: "This is disgraceful," he said.

Later in a public statement he said he had uncovered a "disturbing" fact: the infrastructure agency had engaged only a small number of companies to build flood control projects worth 545bn pesos ($£7.1bn).

Each of these firms are now under scrutiny and the national financial authority has restricted their funds, but the greatest focus has gone to a single firm. It is owned by a couple, who were from poor families but are now a affluent, successful couple visible on social media. Before the floods controversy, Ms Discaya was best known for her unsuccessful bid to become public official of Pasig city.

In the past year the couple were interviewed on well-known platforms, where they shared their rags-to-riches story. The presenter described it as "uplifting". But after the disastrous flooding, those videos have gained renewed attention as sources of outrage.

The footage reveals the couple displaying their numerous luxury cars, including a premium automobile, a SUV and a sports utility vehicle. They bought some models in different shades, black and white.

The backlash was quick. The couple were called by the government inquiries for investigations, and authorities banned their firm, while protesters covered the gates to their office with dirt and marked the word "criminal".

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