Power coops owe Napocor P4.4B as of end June

MANILA, Philippines - Electric cooperatives (ECS) owed National Power Corp. (Napocor) P4.43 billion as of June 30, according to the state-owned power company.

Mindanao-based electric cooperatives account for bulk of the debts or 77.41 percent coming from ECs based in Basilan, Sulu and Tawi-tawi.

Energy Secretary Carlos Jericho Petilla has been prodding ECs to achieve 95 percent collection efficiency, and reduce their system loss to less than 13 percent in order to achieve full payment of their outstanding debts.

Petilla and Napocor president and chief executive officer Ma. Gladys Sta. Rita urged ECs and concerned local government units to work with Napocor to minimize its financial losses in order to continuously improve its mandate of providing electricity to 36 provinces and 255 municipalities nationwide through its Small Power Utilities Group (SPUG).

Sta. Rita said that one of her priorities is to improve the collection efficiency rate, particularly in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (“ARMM).

“We need to immediately put a stop to the corporation’s financial bleeding,” said Sta. Rita, who took over the helm of Napocor last Aug. 1.

Initially, she said this can be achieved with the payment of the outstanding receivables from the ECs for the period January to June 2013 and thereafter the full payment of their current liabilities.

“While we understand the situation of our customer cooperatives, we can no longer afford to incur massive losses. That is why we need to work with our customers and our key stakeholders to come up with concrete, time-bound and workable solutions to address the situation,” she said.

The mounting debts of electric cooperatives have become a thorn on the side of the energy department amid complaints from power generators.

Last July, Albay Electric Cooperative (Aleco) was disconnected from the main grid because of mounting debts, plunging Albay into darkness. It was later reconnected upon the intercession of Petilla and after the cooperative agreed to disconnect their top 100 delinquent accounts.