Senator Risa Hontiveros. INQUIRER.net file photo / CATHY MIRANDA
MANILA, Philippines — “With the flick of a switch, China could plunge the whole Philippines into darkness.”
Senator Risa Hontiveros issued this warning on Monday as she called for a Senate investigation into the country’s power grid to ensure that it remains in “our full control.”
“We want to know if our energy systems are not compromised and if we have the technical safeguards to ensure that these systems and infrastructure continue to be in our full control,” she said in a statement.
The senator said that “China-made blackouts” could sabotage and paralyze the country’s electoral system and economy, access to the internet and other vital information, undermine national security and even topple the government.
This after the president of state-owned National Transmission Company (Transco), Atty. Melvin Matibag, admitted during the Senate deliberation on the proposed budget of the Department of Energy (DOE) that China has the capability to control and even shut down the country’s power transmission system remotely.
It was also discovered that Chinese managers and engineers have access to the operations of the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) which runs the country’s electricity grid.
“Imagine a foreign country, which is an unrepentant trespasser and aggressor in our seas and territories, controlling our national electricity grid. It could cripple our entire society,’ she said.
“With the flick of a switch, China could plunge the whole Philippines into darkness. By the simple push of a button, our country could be at the mercy of China-made blackouts,” she added.
The NGCP, Hontiveros explained, is 40 percent owned by the State Grid Corporation of China and dispatches electricity from power plants to the Philippines’ main grid, which, in turn, transmits it to facilities of distribution companies such as Meralco.