'Mindanao power woes far from over'

DAVAO CITY, Philippines – Several consumer groups insisted that the power crisis in Mindanao is far from over despite assurances from Department of Energy (DOE) officials that the problem has been resolved with the renewed operations of the Agus-Pulangi hydropower complex.

“The power crisis in Mindanao is far from over,” said Freedom from Debt Coalition (FDC) acting president Manjette Lopez, adding that most regions in Mindanao continue to experience blackouts.

The FDC spearheaded the “Mindanao Consumer Summit: Mindanaoans’ Response to the Power Crisis” held here over the weekend and attended by some 150 delegates from different local consumer groups, electric cooperatives and local government units.

The summit participants vowed to actively pursue “people’s solutions” to the Mindanao power crisis through vigorous advocacy and direct actions.

“In fact, the summit delegates from Regions 9, 10, 11, 12 and Caraga disputed the irresponsible statement from DOE Secretary (Rene) Almendras, revealing continuing daily blackouts running for as long as six to eight hours each day,” Lopez said.

The participants also called on the government to stop the sale of assets of the National Power Corp., including the Agus-Pulangi hydropower complex.

In a manifesto, they urged the government to be transparent in providing stakeholders with the results of the technical audit and the latest data on all declared generating capacity in Mindanao, as well as an up-to-date status of on-grid transmission lines.

FDC board member Maitet Diokno, citing government data, said some six million households in Mindanao do not have access to electricity, 42 percent of which are children.

“The prevailing dominance of the corporate private sector in the power industry will further diminish the chances of these communities ever having access to electricity simply because investing in these communities would not be profitable,” Diokno said.

She added that the government has the responsibility to provide these communities with electricity whether or not margins of profit are not viable.

“Mindanaoans must remain vigilant. We are pretty sure that pro-privatization government officials and the corporate private sector are now mulling new tactics to get around the overwhelming sentiment of the people of Mindanao against the sale of Agus-Pulangi,” Lopez said.

Engineer Nestor Degoma, PALAG-Mindanao chairman, alleged that there is an ongoing technical manipulation in ensuring proper dispatch of electricity to the grid based on the recommendations of the plant managers themselves.

“One of them told us that they nominated a higher degree of plant capacity but was only told to generate lower capacity based on the systems control coming from the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines,” Degoma said.