House sets probe on Lanao power coop woes By ALI G. MACABALANG MARAWI CITY – The Committee on Energy of the House of Representatives is set to hold here tomorrow (Friday) a public hearing on the various problems hounding the Lanao del Sur Electric Cooperative (LASURECO) including its unexplained accumulation of P8.3-billion debt to national power supplying entities, facilitators announced yesterday. Set to start from 8:00 a.m. at the provincial Capitol gymnasium here, the House inquiry will be presided over by Rep. Reynaldo Umali, the committee chairman, alongside Lanao del Sur (1st District) Rep. Ansaruddin Adiong, who sought the probe through a resolution seeking a probe on LASURECO’s alleged “gross mismanagement,” the provincial government said. Lanao del Sur Gov. Mamintal “Bombit” Adiong Jr. urged all energy sector stakeholders to attend the public hearing and air their “long unheard sentiments” about LASURECO’s ills vis-à-vis the province’s “miserable state in decades of power outages.” “Our province hosts Lake Lanao, whose lone outlet – the Agus River – is built-in with six dams that produce majority of Mindanao’s hydroelectricity. Yet we have suffered long from worst power deficiency we could blame principally to LASURECO’s inept management,” Gov. Adiong said in underscoring the significance of tomorrow’s event. DILG Sec. Mar Roxas, Energy Secretary Carlos Jericho Petilla, National Electric Administration (NEA) chief Edita Bueno, National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) president Henry T. Sy Jr., Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corporation (PSALM) head Emmanuel Ledesma Jr., and other authorities have been invited as resource speakers, Adiong said. The House inquiry, the first from the national government, will also attended by Governor Mujiv Hataman of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), who had earlier ordered a local probe on the protracted energy woes in Lanao del Sur, it was learned. Lawyer Bato Ali Jr., Commission on Audit director for ARMM, was also invited in the hearing to take steps for an accounting of the fiscal operations of LASURECO, particularly on the causes of its accumulation of debts amounting to P8.3-billion as of last year, Gov. Adiong said. In an official letter dated Nov. 11, 2013, the governor asked President Aquino III and Sec. Petilla to sanction the LASURECO’s alleged “gross mismanagement” with an in-depth and a preventive suspension of the cooperative’s general manager, Sultan Ashary Maongco. Adiong said his letter was attached with documents from PSALM, NGCP and other concerned agencies containing details of how LASURECO’s debts ballooned from P2-billion since Maongco assumed office in 2007. The governor and some of the 39 town mayors in Lanao del Sur also wanted an explanation on Maongco’s alleged conversion of LASURECO into a private body called “Dansalan Power and Lights.” Lawyer Boni Balt, representing a group of disgruntled power consumers, had filed a petition at the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC), protesting the absence of election in the LASURECO’s board of directors. Former Masiu town Mayor Mino Arimao had complained to the media that poultry farms in nearby cities and provinces were enjoying “better power supplies” than all households in Lanao del Sur. The Bulletin tried but failed to get reaction from Maongco, even as Gov. Adiong lamented that the LASURECO executive had allegedly provided previous public forums with “rhetorical” data on the problems besetting the cooperative. (Ali G. Macabalang)
Posted on: Wed, 05 Mar 2014 01:03:10 +0000
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