MANILA, Philippines—The patriarch of the Lopez family Tuesday came out swinging at the Arroyo administration and its officials, saying that with what had been happening, it was as though Ferdinand Marcos’ dictatorship had not ended.

Oscar M. Lopez, who chairs Manila Electric Co., also accused Winston Garcia, president and general manager of the Government Service Insurance System, of trying to orchestrate a takeover of the Lopez family’s flagship firm in a “reverse privatization.”

Lopez made his remarks in a speech that elicited nods and gasps from the audience during the forum “Leadership in Times of Crisis” held in Makati City. The forum had former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani as keynote speaker.

According to Lopez, politicians tend to hit his family as a reflex action after they “get themselves into trouble.” He said this was true during the term of Marcos, “the then President then later dictator.”

“It is happening again today, as officials of both the executive and legislative branches of government are ganging up on the Lopez management in Meralco when their real gripe is with [the family’s] ABS-CBN,” he said.

The Lopezes—who are involved in broadcasting and power generation and distribution, among other businesses—have maintained that the Arroyo administration was moving to take over Meralco because of the negative publicity that it was getting from ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corp., the Philippines’ largest broadcast network.

Lopez conceded that his family’s business lines had exposed it to “serious political risks.” But he said it would persevere through its current crisis, citing similarities in its fortunes with the mythical phoenix (also the title of the family’s published history).

“The Winston Garcias of this world will come and go, just as the Marcoses and their cronies did,” he said.

The Lopezes are the majority owners of Meralco. GSIS owns 22.05 percent of the stock.

Democratic country

Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita said it was “hardly true” that Malacañang was going after Meralco because of the negative publicity it was getting from ABS-CBN.

“That could just be his (Lopez’s) defense ... We are a democratic country,” Ermita said, adding that if the government would go after any person or corporation, it was because the latter had broken the law.

Ermita also said he could not see how Lopez could compare the Arroyo administration with the Marcos dictatorship in the matter concerning Meralco.

“We are not under martial law, for that matter,” he said.

Reached on the phone, Garcia said: “The trouble with the Lopezes is that they always equate to politics our calls for lower power rates.”

He said that instead of accusing the GSIS of being involved in the politics of the Arroyo administration, the Lopezes should answer the charge that Meralco had been overcharging its customers.

“The Lopezes should face the issue squarely. Why is Meralco’s rates 20 to 30 percent higher [than those charged by other power distributors in the country]?” Garcia said.

Track record

Lopez used Tuesday’s speaking engagement to defend his family’s track record in business, laying part of the blame on the government for its troubles, especially in the sensitive issue of power rates.

He pointed out that Meralco used to sell the cheapest electricity in Asia in the early 1970s at only P0.06 per kilowatt hour compared to almost P6 per kilowatt hour today.

“Probably the most important part in this equation that can be replicated is that it was a private business enterprise responding successfully to the challenges of the times and its environment, rendering the best possible public, political and economic service at the least cost to its consumers, and still [making] a profit in the process,” Lopez said.

“Contrast this to what we have today when our electricity rates are among the highest in Asia because the post-Marcos governments have dominated the generation and transmission sectors of the power industry all these years—almost as if the Marcos dictatorship never ended,” he said.

Lopez said there appeared to be “no urgency in the government’s desire to [sell] the power industry to the private sector, as dictated by law.”

“And if you will follow Mr. Winston Garcia, he is trying to undertake a reverse privatization process,” Lopez said. “He wants government to control Meralco. And for what? Either for the government or to sell this to cronies in Cebu.”

Embarrassment

In a statement, Garcia said the Lopez family “only embarrassed itself before the international community” with Oscar Lopez’s “pathetic tirades.”

“I’m not inclined to stop anyone from making a complete fool of himself,” Garcia said.

He said the arguments raised by Lopez at the leadership forum were fallacious and intended to elicit misplaced sympathy.

“The Lopezes have no business in politics. Neither should they involve their media outlet to destroy people or advance their selfish interests,” Garcia said.

“Something is very wrong when a public utility company is allowed to operate a media outfit because it can muzzle public outcry against the utility’s excesses, or threaten public officials, or even the judiciary,” he said.

On the phone with the Philippine Daily Inquirer, Garcia claimed that the GSIS wanted to take over Meralco only to improve its management and to provide lower power rates to its customers.

He said overpricing by Meralco was one of the major reasons the average power cost in the country was the highest in the region.

Failed takeover

The GSIS’ earlier attempt to take over Meralco failed during the power utility’s last stockholders’ meeting.

In that heated meeting that lasted for nearly 14 hours on May 27, Meralco stockholders voted five pro-Lopez directors and two independent directors into the 11-member board.

GSIS questioned about 1.9 billion shares whose owners had designated the Lopez group as their proxies and secured an order from the Securities and Exchange Commission stopping Meralco from including the proxy votes.

But in a ruling on July 24, the Court of Appeals voided the SEC’s cease-and-desist order and upheld Meralco’s position that the commission had no jurisdiction over the issue. With reports from Michelle V. Remo and Christine O. Avendaño