Supreme Court stops government from privatizing Angat power plant

MANILA, Philippines - The Supreme Court (SC) has stopped the government from privatizing the controversial Angat Dam’s hydroelectric power plant in Bulacan.

Chief Justice Renato Corona, acting in behalf of the SC, issued yesterday a status quo ante and ordered the respondent, state-run Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. (PSALM) to comment within ten days upon receipt on the petition of a group of cause-oriented organizations to permanently stop the government from selling the Angat hydroelectric power plant to a South Korean state-owned firm.

The act is believed to be Corona’s first official order since assuming office last May 17, amid a constitutional controversy over his so-called midnight appointment.

Cause-oriented groups asked the High Court last May 19 to permanently prohibit the government from selling the Angat power facility.

The petitioners, led by Freedom from Debt Coalition (FDC), claimed that the PSALM, an agency tasked with selling government-owned power plants, acted with grave abuse of discretion when it conducted the bidding of the hydroelectric power plant in secrecy and in disregard of the people’s right to information, right to water and in violation of its mandate and the Constitution.

Petitioners were Rebecca Malay of the FDC, Loretta Ann Rosales of the Akbayan Citizen’s Action Party, Daniel Edralin of the Alliance of Progressive Labor (APL), Akbayan Rep. Walden Bello, and Edgardo Ligon of the Initiatives for Dialogue and Empowerment through Alternative Legal Services Inc. (IDEALS Inc.).

Respondents were PSALM, Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS), National Irrigation Administration (NIA), Korea Water Resources Corp. (K-Water), First Gen Northern Energy Corp., San Miguel Corp. (SMC), SN Aboitiz Power-Pangasinan Inc., Trans-Asia Oil and Energy Development Corp., and DMCI Power Corp.

“Angat Dam is the single-most important water source of Metro Manila,” said Milo Tanchuling, FDC secretary- general.

He said Angat Dam provides 97 percent of the water needs of at least 12 million residents of the country’s capital and irrigates some 31,000 hectares of farms across 20 towns and municipalities in Bulacan and Pampanga.

Under Republic Act 9136 or the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA), PSALM is mandated to privatize all the assets of the National Power Corp. (Napocor), including the Angat hydroelectric power plant.

The groups claimed that as the process of privatization moves on, violations of constitutionally guaranteed rights of the people in its exclusion unfold, as revealed in the ongoing privatization of the power plant.

Lawyer Maribel Arias, counsel for the petitioners, said the petition was presented before the SC “to call for the exercise of its constitutionally declared power to determine whether or not grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction has been committed by the PSALM in the conduct of the Angat hydroelectric power plant bidding.”

PSALM, on the other hand, argued that a new player in the Philippine power sector, the Korea Water Resources Development Corp. (K-Water), offered the highest bid for the 218-megawatt Angat power facility on April 28, 2010.

K-Water offered $440.88 million to edge out five other bidders.

The other bidders were DMCI Power Corp. ($188.89 million), First Gen Northern Energy Corp. ($365 million), SMC ($312.50 million), SN-Aboitiz Power Pangasinan Inc. ($256 million) and Trans-Asia Oil & Energy Development Corp. ($237 million).

PSALM noted that K-Water’s bid exceeded the reserve price set by the state agency for the power plant.