Deputy Minority Leader and Basilan Rep. Mujiv Hataman has sought a congressional inquiry into the “frequent and incessant” power outages in his province, a large part of which he believes can be attributed to the operations and management of the local power cooperative.
Hataman filed House Resolution 1157 urging the appropriate committee at the House of Representatives to look into the Basilan Electric Cooperative (BASELCO), whose franchise to operate will be revisited by Congress when it expires in 2028.
He said power outages have really caused huge economic losses in our province.
In fact, the Basilan lawmaker said, the delivery of goods and services to Basileños, including public services and government programs, have been affected by the frequent power outages.
“Imagine the operations of hospitals, dialysis centers, birthing clinics, and other health institutions in a situation where almost every two to three hours, there is a power failure,” Hataman, a human rights advocate, expressed.
According to HR 1157, BASELCO’s franchise to operate will expire in 2028, and “there is a need for Congress to decide whether or not to renew its franchise for another 50 years … or to look at other options such as the creation of a separate electric cooperative for Isabela City or granting the franchise to a private Distribution Utility.”
The resolution also enumerated the problems surrounding the operations of BASELCO, including its debts to the National Power Corporation and the lack of a capacity to implement capital expenditures.
“BASELCO owes NPC ₱3.2 billion in loans … In this regard, BASELCO is currently paying its debt to NPC at the ratio of 60% payment of interest and 40% payment of the principal amount,” the resolution read.
“Capital expenditures have been minimal or non-existent for nearly 20 years due to high debt servicing rates and inadequate revenue earnings
of BASELCO,” it added.
It continued that in a stakeholder’s forum held in October last year in Isabela City, BASELCO and NPC officials cited that frequent
blackouts experienced in Basilan stemmed from the following reasons:
1. Aging wires, posts, and connections, most of which are at least 46 years old;
2. Technical losses – reduced from a high of 36% to the current 20%;
3. Financing problems;
4. Vegetation control/right of way issues with landowners who refuse to allow BASELCO workers to undertake sustained line clearing
operations in their private lands; and
5. Other concerns, such as the collection rates, pilferage rates, missionary electrification, reclosers, etc.
“We would like to know more about how legislation can ease the woes of BASELCO and other similarly situated electric cooperatives,” Hataman
stressed.