| DIE HARD III |
 |
| Herman Tiu Laurel |
04/23/2012
The Filipino people as a whole have finally awakened to the
electrocution they have been victim to by the Electric Power Industry
Reform Act (Epira) passed and signed into law 10 years ago. It took the
resistance of our brothers in Mindanao for the rest of the country to
realize that a fight does exist between the commonweal and the interest
of the oligarchy. For so long, the oligarchs have encroached on and
taken over government to execute their extractions of profit and wealth
at the expense of the people.
Luzon and the Visayas were first to
be hit by the thunderbolts of greed. And perhaps because the shock and
confusion at that time was still too novel, both succumbed to defeat.
Mindanao, on the other hand, which enjoyed a decade-long exemption from
the Epira, had ample time to witness the disastrous economic impact of
that law and its deleterious effect on the lives of their brothers
northward. And so it was when the oligarchs’ final phase of
privatization kicked in, Mindanao was already poised to fight back.
Among
the many pivotal personalities who need to be commended in this crusade
is Mr. Luis “Louie” Corral, who has been key to preparing the studies
that many of Mindanao’s political leaders are using to inform themselves
and the public, as well as to prepare for their debates with the
Department of Energy (DoE) on the power crisis and the Agus-Pulangi
hydroelectric complex. These points — which would have been
incontrovertible even by Epira’s standards and those of high power price
champion, Sen. Serge Osmeña — were all set to be presented to PeNoy at
the Davao power summit two Fridays ago but were set aside because the
chief executive opted to harangue the summit’s 1,000 attendees with an
irked lecture.
Perhaps because a few sensible people admonished
him some time after that, BS Aquino III surprisingly had a change in
tone. Last April 21, for instance, it was reported that he gave an order
to “Review power rates,” noting that the “…Hike in electricity charges
in Visayas,” in regard to the latest Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC)
approvals of rate hike petitions, “may be unwarranted.”
This
announcement, of course, is a heretofore unheard of expression of
interest, concern, and sympathy for the plight of power consumers from
PeNoy, which we anti-Epira crusaders can only hope is a sign that a
spark of realization of the very real and massive problem of power rates
in this country has been triggered. We hope, too, that this is a sign
that the power of the oligarchs’ agents, such as Serge Osmeña and Dina
Abad, is already on the wane. Maybe it is also PeNoy’s realization of
the political impact of his failure at the Davao summit, which could
seriously damage his 2013 senatorial slate. Whatever it is, we hope BS
Aquino III has now finally wised up because the nation will need his
support to weather the worst of the electric storms to come.
Louie
Corral has an excellent Power Point summation of the thunderbolts that
will be hitting us if nothing is done to avert the damage that Epira has
caused the 92 million Filipino consuming public. In the section, “The
Coming Storm,” we are alerted to: “Additional rate increases from Psalm
(Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp.)’s P1 trillion
stranded costs… as part of the ‘Universal Charge’… (will) cost an
additional P0.39 per kilowatt-hour (kWh); (the National Power Corp. or
Napocor’s Small Power Utility Group’s) budget shortfall of P7 billion
just for 2011… (will cost an) additional P0.07/kWh… (also for) the
‘Universal Charge;’ an additional SPUG budget shortfall of P3.1 billion
(going to) the ERC’s Incremental Currency Exchange Rate Adjustment
(Icera) and Generation Rate Adjustment Mechanism (Gram)… will increase
power rates for off-grid areas; the Napocor-Manila Electric Co.
P14-billion Court of Appeals settlement may prompt Meralco to
pass-through the amount of penalty to its consumers.
“Pending ERC
petitions of Meralco, Davao Light and Power, Visayas Electric Co., and
other distribution utilities (including 119 electric cooperatives);
transition supply contracts between distribution corporations and/or
Napocor and the privatized generating firms end(ing) in 2011 (that) are
up for renewal… (noting that since) these generating companies are
defined under the Epira as not being utilities, and therefore not
subject to a 12-percent ceiling on (their rates of return)… the end
result is that… generation charges will zoom up with their new
contracts; transition supply contracts of independent power producers
(IPP)… selling through an IPP Administrator (salesman or middleman)
end(ing) in 2011… will bring up generation charges (with new IPP
contracts); the proposed Renewable Energy program with its feed-in
tariff would tie the country up to immature, unreliable and expensive
power that would entail an additional P0.1256/kWh; the Supreme Court
case on the illegal dismissal of Napocor workers that will net back
wages of up to P48 billion…”
Louie adds: “Every one centavo per
kWh increase represents P657,000,000 per annum (based on current demand
of 7,300 megawatts); one centavo/kWh of power increase means 40 percent
or P263,000,000 taken away, which should be food for the poor (based on
lifeline rates); (while) 10 percent (of it) or P118,000 represents
educational costs, medicine, transportation or house rentals.”
There
are many, many more alerts issued by Louie that we will have to include
in our next columns. But there is an important one that we must
highlight right now: The much-vaunted full “open access,” which the DoE
and ERC keep claiming will bring down rates, but which may instead cause
rates to rise as large scale commercial/industrial consumers like giant
malls and the like set up their own power plants, causing Meralco and
its ilk to compensate for lost revenues by filing petitions for more
rate hikes. At this point, only fools won’t see that these are the
unintended consequences of an ill-thought-out, greed-motivated,
corruption-tainted privatization law.
(Tune in to 1098AM, dwAD,
Sulo ng Pilipino/Radyo OpinYon, Monday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m.; watch
Destiny Cable GNN’s HTL edition of Talk News TV, Saturdays, 8:15 to 9
p.m., with replay at 11:15 p.m., for constant updates on “The power
thunderbolts to hit;” visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com for our
articles plus TV and radio archives)
(Reprinted with permission from Mr. Herman Tiu-Laurel)
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL:
http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20120423com5.html
