Mindanao businesses say no to shutdowns

DAVAO CITY—Business groups in Mindanao said it would be “business as usual” on Election Day, ignoring the government’s call to shut down their operations for a day to ensure enough power to conduct the midterm elections.

“We do not believe a work stoppage is the solution to our power shortage,” said Vicente Lao, chair of the Mindanao Business Council (MBC).

“The better option is for the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) to approve higher payment rates for companies participating in the government’s Interruptible Loan Program (ILP) in order to encourage more businesses to participate,” Lao said.

The Mindanao Development Authority (Minda) has supported the proposed revision of the ILP rates to encourage large establishments in Mindanao, including malls, factories and packing plants, to run their generators during peak hours and temporarily ease the demand on the grid.

Minda Secretary Luwalhati Antonino earlier said that a 100-megawatt reduction in the load of the Mindanao grid would translate to a reduction in the duration of brownouts by at least two hours.

But Antonino said that only a few of the big establishments registered for the government’s ILP.

She said that the current rates, based on the ERC’s 2010 ILP ruling, gave incentives only for fuel recovery costs for the use of generators and did not encourage malls and factories to participate.

Sebastian Angliongto, chair emeritus of the Davao City Chamber of Commerce and Industry Inc., said that business establishments may scale down their operations or close down prior to the elections to boost electricity reserves but they cannot be forced to shut down on Election Day itself.

“We would rather close down on the weekend before the elections, but for businesses to temporarily close down on the day of the elections will result in a lot of losses, which is unfair to the businesses,” Angliongto said.

If plans to tap diesel and coal-fed power plants push through, however, there may be no need for businesses to close shop on Election Day.

According to Minda, the power supply in Mindanao on Election Day is expected to reach 1,330 megawatts, more than enough to meet a projected demand of 1,126 MW.

In a statement, Romeo Montenegro, head of investment promotions and public affairs for Minda, said Mindanao will have a power surplus of 204 MW on Election Day.

Since Friday, he said signs pointed to a stable power supply since no brownouts had been reported since that day, even in General Santos and Zamboanga cities where outages have lasted up to 10 hours a day.

At least two plants will be commissioned to make sure that power is not cut on Election Day and these are the Iligan Diesel Power Plant and the one owned by Therma Marine Corp. Germelina Lacorte and Kaiza Marie Nawal, Inquirer Mindanao