By | Jan. 23, 2014 at 12:01am
The Committee on Energy in the House of Representatives on Wednesday chided the Energy Regulatory Commission for its failure to come up with the result of its investigation on the alleged collusion among power distributors and generators.
The committee headed by Oriental Mindoro Rep. Reynaldo Umali demanded an explanation from ERC officials led by its chair Zenaida Ducut on what took them long to finish the probe into the issue.
Ducut, together with Energy Secretary Jericho Petilla, was among the resource persons in the hearing.
Ducut, however, failed to provide the congressmen a definite answer on their query, saying that ERC is not yet done with the investigation.
This was the explanation contained in a report by the ERC’s Investigation Unit, a copy of which was submitted to the House committee.
“A significant amount of time is necessary to collect, prepare, validate and assess data which would be the basis of the IU’s recommendation to the Commission. Evaluation of the data likely will require the IU to call persons to give testimony or additional data,” the report said.
Last year, Ducut and other energy officials promised to provide the committee a copy of the result of its investigation on the alleged power collusion when the committee resumes its session this year.
Umali urged the ERC to finish the report as soon as possible since the committee would also conduct hearing on the amendments to the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA).
“Please put priority over this issue, because we cannot tell the people to wait for the answers on why the electricity in the country is too high,” said.
The Manila Electric Company (Meralco) earlier asked for a P4.15 adjustment on the generation charge which the ERC immediately approved even without adequate public consultation.
But Meralco failed to implement the increase supposedly on a staggered basis after the Supreme Court issued a temporary restraining order stopping it from implementing the increase.
Bayan Muna party-list Rep. Neri Colmenares, one of the petitioners in the power rate hike, lambasted the ERC for “its long delayed report and its findings are more of a cover up.”
“It is not unreasonable to suspect that they would eventually say that there was no collusion or price manipulation,”
Colmenares added the people would want to know if there was indeed a collusion among the power players, and took the ERC to task for its failure to cooperate and provide the public with an answer.
Joining Bayan Muna in its clamor for the Ducut’s ouster were representatives of various labor and sectoral groups such as Akbayan Representatives Walden Bello and Barry Gutierrez.
The two said they will lead the group which will file a complaint against Ducut for ‘gross neglect of duty and incompetence in protecting the intrest of the electricity consumers’ before the Office of the President.
The group will also assail Ducut for being a “pork agent” of the Napoles PDAF syndicate.
The group also alleged that the people’s constitutional right to due process was violated when the ERC approved the price adjustment without conducting public hearings.
They questioned why the ERC, which is under the DOE, approved the rate increase last Dec. 9 or just four days after Meralco submitted its proposal.
The group said the public was not duly informed about the adjustment since there was no publication.
“The President can remove her from office. The Constitution provides that the President shall have control of all the executive departments, bureaus and offices to ensure efficiency in the government,” he said.
In the same hearing, Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. (PSALM) president Emmanuel Ledesma Jr., said that it avoided incurring losses of as much as P1 billion by not running the 620 megawatt Malaya diesel power plant during the Malampaya shutdown in November.
Ledesma explained to the committee that the agency’s mandate is to ensure that government’s debts and losses will not continue to balloon.
PSALM was similarly under fire for not utilizing the Malaya diesel plant owned by National Power Corp. which critics believe would have helped mitigate the price spikes at the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market during the 30-day Malampaya maintenance shutdown.
He added that PSALM placed a bid at the WESM but did not synchronize the plant to the power grid because it did not want to be dispatched, thereby avoiding losses, which will be shouldered by consumers under the universal charge for stranded debt.
Ledesma said that when he joined PSALM in 2010, his mandate from the PSALM chairman, Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima was clear – bring down the debt and fix the financials of the agency.
He said PSALM was “in a very deep financial hole” at that time.
Ledesma said the Malaya diesel plant costs around P10 to P11 per kWh to run which meant losses to PSALM if the price offer at the WESM is lower.
“The losses will be passed on stranded debt in the universal charge. It will go to the consumers, we cannot increase the losses so in my mind that is not a correct thing to do,” Ledesma said, referring to selling power from Malampaya at a loss. With Alena Mae Flores and Vito Barcelo source
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