Following pole deaths: Telecom, power firms assure public safety

CEBU, Philippines - Telecommunication and power utility firms operating in Cebu City have assured to keep the public safe from possible dangers their posts and wires may pose.

During an emergency meeting yesterday, the firms agreed that the city can revoke their business permit should they fail to meet safety standards.

Present during the meeting were representatives from Visayan Electric Company; Bayan Telecommunications; Globe Telecom; Innove Communications, Inc.; Telecom Infrastructure Corp. of the Philippines; SkyCable Digitel; and Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company.

The city gathered the companies following recent incidents involving utility posts that caused the death of two people – a woman and a 13-year-old boy.

Yesterday, the companies pledged to comply strictly with City Ordinance 1894, which requires all public utilities to transfer their overhead utility cables underground.

They also agreed to remove leaning poles, replace rotten wooden poles, dangling wires, and observe vertical clearance standards. They also assured to inspect their poles and wires regularly and submit a report during scheduled weekly meetings with the city’s Technical Infrastructure Committee headed by city engineer Jose Marie Poblete.

“We commit to do the following before October 28, 2015,” reads the four-page agreement that the firms’ representatives signed.

The date is the birth date of Mayor Michael Rama.

Interestingly, the document also states that the firms’ failure to follow the agreement would allow Rama “to expose the utilities’ insensitivity and non-compliance, irresponsibility and lack of concern” to the public’s welfare.

“Dili gani mohatag og pagpakabana ang atong mga utility firms, the city government through the City Legal Office will come in under the concept of parens patria. Mosulod ta diha kay kita sa city government dapat mu-protekta sa mga constituents,” Poblete said.

Meanwhile, during the City Council’s regular session yesterday, Councilor Nestor Archival Sr. requested the Association of Barangay Councils to make inventory of unused overhead wires and dilapidated posts in the respective barangays to provide the utility firms necessary information for their “housekeeping.”

In a privilege speech, Archival said it is also fitting to look into the standard overhead height requirement in installing utility poles and wires, as well as establish minimum “sag heights” of overhead wires.

“Are these utility firms compliant with the height requirement? Are these utility firms compliant with the standard for the installation of poles?” Archival said.

Archival chairs the council’s committee on energy, transportation, communication and other utilities.

Last July 7, Ralph Bureros, 13, died while Jeserea Ambros, 13, was injured after a utility pole collapsed on them after a dangling wire connected to the pole allegedly got snagged by a passing truck along McArthur Boulevard, Barangay Tinago.

Last Sunday, 54-year-old Irene Bordon was knocked unconscious after getting hit on the head while Delia Bingala, 52, suffered injuries to her hands after a utility pole fell on them on Veteran’s Drive, Barangay Lahug after a boom truck snagged low-hanging wires.

Bordon passed away Monday night. — /JMO (FREEMAN)