Proclamations put period to Luzon election contests
The ballots have been counted in many provinces, giving fresh mandate to new leaders by July.
The ballots have been counted in many provinces, giving fresh mandate to new leaders by July.
A beauty pageant contestant has filed rape charges in the Department of Justice (DOJ) against the mayor and vice mayor of Pantabangan, Nueva Ecija.
Debunking her detractors that she was promoting the creation of a landfill here, a mayoral candidate maintained that she continues to oppose the project.
Pantabangan town, which hosts one of the biggest dams in the country and the hydroelectric electric firm that supplies power to the Luzon power grid, has been suffering from a power outage since March 7 after its power supplier cut off the local distributor from its system due to mounting debts.
Nineteen towns and four cities in Nueva Ecija were placed under strict monitoring by the police due to heightening political rivalries in those areas.
After having two officials tangling over the mayor’s seat three months ago, this city is now without a mayor. Vice Mayor Ester Lazaro said she would not assume the mayoral seat even as Mayor Efren Alvarez has gone on another prolonged absence after the Sandiganbayan issued a warrant for his arrest on graft charges on Feb. 15. This prompted the National Bureau of Investigation and the Philippine National Police to run after him.
As Pantabangan, Nueva Ecija, endured a town-wide power outage for the second day on Tuesday, residents tried to find ways to cope with the problem.
At least two provinces and a city in Luzon should brace for brownouts after the electric cooperatives serving them failed to pay billions of pesos in debt to power generation companies, including the state-run Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. (Psalm).
The electric supply company that owns and operates a hydropower facility in Pantabangan, Nueva Ecija, on Saturday announced it would cut off power to the town for town officials’ failure to settle debts exceeding P20 million.
Observing that onion farmers in San Jose City in Nueva Ecija no longer relied on doleouts, Mayor Marivic Belena decided in 2008 they were ready to become businessmen, embarking on a bridge program aimed at providing them a market.
Saying they do not want their town to be known as the “garbage town of Central and Northern Luzon,” residents of Cuyapo in Nueva Ecija have petitioned their town government to turn down a landfill project.
The firm that supplies electricity to this town has disowned a Manila-based company that claims to operate Pantabangan’s power utility.
About 1,000 families, who live under bridges or along creeks, or who have lost their homes to typhoons and other calamities, are to be provided havens in two resettlement projects here.
