BACOLOD City – With consumers’ welfare in mind, Central Negros Electric Cooperative (Ceneco) and Primelectric Holdings, Inc./Negros Electric Power Corporation (NEPC) entered into a joint venture agreement (JVA) on Saturday, June 3, to improve power distribution service in the cooperative’s franchise areas.
The signatories were Ceneco president Jojit Yap and acting general manager Arnel Lapore, and Primelectric Holdings president and chief executive officer Roel Castro.
Primelectric Holdings is a sister company of MORE Electric and Power Corporation (MORE Power), the sole power distributor in Iloilo City.
Lapore said the JVA will become effective once majority (50 percent plus one) of Ceneco’s member-consumer-owners (MCOs) will ratify it in a plebiscite on June 24 and 25, and July 1 and 2.
Ceneco has 210,000 MCOs from the cities of Bacolod, Silay, Talisay and Bago, and the municipalities of Murcia and Don Salvador Benedicto in the province of Negros Occidental.
The JVA signing was witnessed by Negros Occidental vice governor Jeffrey Ferrer, Abang Lingkod party-list’s Rep. Stephen Paduano, and several punong barangays from Ceneco’s coverage areas.
Castro described the JVA as historic.
“This JVA is, more than anything else, aims to deliver better service to consumers within the franchise area of the electric cooperative. We are here to extend whatever technical (and) financial needs,” Castro said.
For his part, Ferrer hailed the JVA as a good move on the part of the Ceneco board of directors.
Local government units in the coverage areas of Ceneco favor the JVA, he added.
Ferrer is confident that the JVA will be ratified by Ceneco’s MCOs.
“Basi masobra pa ni sa 50 percent plus one kay advantageous ini para sa consumers. Just today may bill deposit refund ang MORE Power in Iloilo City. Why not himoon man diri,” the vice governor pointed out.
Lapore said the JVA gives Ceneco the opportunity to modernize its facilities, address the frequent brownouts and tame the system losses of the electric cooperative reaching P15 million to P20 million monthly.
Vista Alegre barangay captain Jose Maria Leandro Norberto De Leon here said he is supporting the JVA because it is beneficial to consumers. He expects, among other, affordable electricity rates.
“This is now or never kun gusto ta magbag-o ang serbisyo,” Paduano told punong barangays prior to the signing.
He cited MORE Power’s performance in Iloilo City.
“Nagnubo na ang ila rates. And just today (June 3) I have with me the news that under the law, supposedly ang imo bayad (bill deposit) sand nagpatakod ka dapat ibalik after three years. MORE Power did that in Iloilo City, a first in the whole country,” Paduano added.
Meanwhile, Bacolod City’s Sangguniang Panlungsod (SP) committee on energy and public utilities chaired by Councilor Claudio Jesus Puentevella will conduct today, June 5, a public consultation on the JVA at the SP Session Hall.
MORE Power is expected to make a presentation, according to Puentevella.
The councilor said the city council received several position papers from groups supportive and against the JVA./PN
