Begging for an end to PECO-MORE tiff

By Herbert Vego

 

WOULD its latest legal defeat stop Panay Electric Co. (PECO) from further pestering More Electric and Power Corp. (MORE Power)?

I have in mind the decision of the Department of Justice (DOJ) dismissing PECO’s case against four persons who had allegedly conspired with a Facebook group known as “No to PECO Franchise Renewal” in fabricating 27,000 signatures in a petition asking the House of Representatives to junk PECO’s application for franchise renewal.

The number of signatures was insignificant.  It was the valid issues raised by the petitioners against PECO – such as hazardous “spaghetti wirings”, outrageous power rates, wrong meter readings, power pilferage, overbilling and poor public relations – that had mattered.

Six months have passed since MORE Power took over PECO as the power distributor in Iloilo City, one would think the latter would give peace a chance.

The irony of it all is that some advocates of the “No to PECO Franchise Renewal” are now conniving with PECO through another group known as Koalisyon Bantay Kuryente (KBK).

KBK has fired its first salvo — an insinuation that MORE Power’s systems loss in one month has blown up to 7.17%. In energy lingo, systems loss refers to electricity wasted during transmission from source to consumers, or to electricity pilfered through “jumpers”.

MORE Power has debunked that insinuation for being based on “wrong computation.” If I am not mistaken, the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) has set a systems loss cap of only 6.5 %.

MORE Power’s defense is that it charges customers a systems loss of only 6%; and that if KBK were correct, then PECO’s last systems loss for its last month of February 2020 would have reached a higher 8.13%.

Oh well, that technical trivia sounds Greek to us electricity users whose main concern is having it 24/7. Let the ERC do the math.

PECO’s holier-than-thou stance tends to boomerang. For instance, we are now aware that it has tolerated the build-up of 30,000 illegal connections by way of charging power pilferage to paying customers.

PECO has yet to fully comply with an ERC decision dating back to the year 2005, ordering it to refund the P630 million it has overcharged Ilonggo consumers.

The Iloilo Economic Development Foundation (IEDF) believes that, having earned billions of pesos in nearly a century of operation, PECO could have upgraded its facilities. It could have invested P500 million in a state-of-the-art switching system to replace its obsolete 1950 model.

This makes it hard for its successor to conduct preventive maintenance on the old distribution lines and sub-stations without causing brownouts.

We know that More Power President Roel Castro has offered his “reconciliation hand′′ to PECO.

“The relationship of More Power and PECO should not be viewed as a corporate war,” he said. “Let the court decide.”

The court has already upheld the constitutionality of the law (RA 11212) expropriating the distribution utility in MORE Power’s favor.

What makes Mr. Cacho unwilling to cash the P482 million that MORE Power has stashed away for “just compensation” to PECO?

Kulang pa bang pambayad sa kanilang Manila-based lawyers?

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THERE is obvious animosity between Capiz Governor Evan “Nonoy” Contreras and Roxas City Mayor Ronnie Dadivas.

We learned from the governor’s office that Contreras had issued a “show cause order” against Dadivas over failure of 53 Capiznons to come home on board a ship sailing from Batangas to Roxas City on August 26.

The governor claims that they have been stranded in Batangas for three weeks already despite having produced complete documentations from the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) and the Philippine Coast Guard, as well as letters of acceptance from their respective towns.

Is it true that the only obstacle to their homecoming is the objection of Mayor Dadivas?

Hindi sila nag-iisa. There are similar cases of “pandemic snobbery” in Iloilo, as in the case of x-ray technician Keith Parreño who was returning from Kalibo, Aklan to his home at barangay Licud in the town of Dingle.

The mayor and the barangay captain would allegedly not allow him unless he agreed to be quarantined together with LSIs, PUMs and PUIs. It surprised him because he had traveled from a province that had been classified as “low-risk”.

Knowing he is a frontliner and none of the above, he proceeded to a cousin’s house in Barotac Viejo. There was no objection from the mayor and the barangay officials there.

Tuod bala ang alegasyon? May we hear from Dingle mayor Rufino “Bitoy” Palabrica?

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ALL Southern Iloilo towns and the component city of Passi are set to lead the implementation of “pooled swab testing” in the Province of Iloilo.

We learned about if from First District Representative Janette Loreto-Garin, who led the participants of a “zoom webinar”  and virtual signing of the memorandum of agreement for the “Pooled Testing Launch” with Malacañang and various government agencies last Thursday.

“We have a long-lasting pandemic without a vaccine or a cure yet,” Garin said.”  We need to know how to co-exist with this virus. We need to attack COVID, not just wait for it to show via the symptoms manifested by the patients.  We need to keep on testing and  immediately isolate the positives while allowing the negatives to help our economy recover.”

The other “webinarians” were Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque, Labor and Employment Secretary Silvestre Bello, Presidential Adviser for Entrepreneurship and Go Negosyo founder Joey Concepcion, Passi City Vice Mayor Jesry Palmares,  AAMBIS OWA partylist Representative Sharon Garin, Vice Governor Christine “Tingting” Garin, former First District Representative Engineer Oscar “Richard” Garin Jr., the  First District mayors, Southern Iloilo Health Zone President Dr. Rodel Gedalanga and Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Undersecretary Aimee Neri.

Neri assured the online audience that an emergency subsidy of P5,000 would be given to those who test positive for COVID and therefore would  undergo quarantine in a government facility

Concepcion, speaking on behalf of the business community, stressed the need to beat COVID-19 as the way “to save lives, jobs, and livelihoods..”

“Pooled testing” means collecting five individual samples in one test kit.

Aba, malaking katipiran ‘yan, Inday Florence.

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REMEMBER those childhood days when we boys would play “patayug-tayog ihi” to determine who could spurt urine to the farthest distance?

That reminds me of the apparent figurative equivalent of the game between two Aklan congressmen who filed two different bills with the same goal. Rep. Carlito Marquez of the 1^st District bats for the creation of the Boracay Island Development Authority (BIDA) against 2^nd Dict. Rep. Ted Haresco’s Boracay Development Council (BDC).

Their salient points may differ but they both aim to institutionalize the management of Boracay under the national government. There is already such existing management known as the Boracay Inter-Agency Task Force (BIATF), but it’s a temporary body nearing its expiration date of May 31, 2021.

Walang tiwala sa local government unit of Malay?

Katodo Jonathan Cabrera could only scratch his shiny head while telling his radio audience that nine other identical house bills by other congressmen have been filed.

But BIDA has the advantage of having been endorsed by the Sangguniang Panlalawigan in a resolution.

The bills would no doubt be collated and merged by the committee on local government into one final version. But as to which between “BIDA” and “BDC” would make it to the title of the emerging law, whichever sounds heroic stands a better chance.

But then, who could underestimate Haring Haresco?