Power consumers hold online ‘noise barrage’

PALAG Na! Batok sa Mahal ug Hugaw nga Kuryente sa Mindanao, an organization composed of concerned power consumers and civil society organizations in Mindanao, conducted an online noise barrage and protest with participants from the cities of Davao, Cagayan De Oro, Ozamiz, Tangub, and Zamboanga on November 30 to pressure the Department of Energy (DOE) and the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) to investigate non-compliant distribution utilities (DU) in Mindanao.

The group previously sent a letter addressed to DOE secretary Hon. Alfonso Cusi on May 21, 2021, called for an investigation on Mindanao DUs which has not complied with the May 3 2019 Supreme Court ruling that all Power Supply Agreement applications submitted by DUs to the ERC on or after 30 June 2015 shall comply with the Competitive Selection Process (CSP) in accordance with Department of Energy Circular No. DC2018-02-0003 (2018 DOE Circular), Annex A, which states that the DUs cannot pass on to their consumers the payments that they are making to the generating companies under the PSAs that did not carry out CSPs.

According to Palag Na!, 37 PSAs of eighteen DUs in Mindanao affected by the Supreme Court decision have not complied substantially with the requirements, and have refused to cease collection of payments from their consumers to pay for the power supply purchased by the DUs under anomalous PSAs.

“None of the distribution utilities in Mindanao who entered into the PSAs cited by the Supreme Court conducted any generally-acceptable form of public bidding or least cost procurement prior to negotiating their PSAs with the generating companies,” Engr. Dave Tauli, Palag Na! convenor, said.

He added that distribution utilities have falsified their claims and communications to the DOE, by stating that they have conducted competitive selection processes for the PSAs.

“We call on the DOE and the ERC to investigate and probe into the anomalous activity of DUs, and urge these concerned DUs to cease collection of payments from consumers until after the DOE has verified their compliance with the SC decision,” Tauli said.