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[av_heading heading=’Scrutinize proposed Baciwa deal, SP urged’ tag=’h3′ style=’blockquote modern-quote’ size=” subheading_active=’subheading_below’ subheading_size=’15’ padding=’10’ color=” custom_font=”]
BY MAE SINGUAY
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BACOLOD City – A consumer group will ask the Sangguniang Panlungsod to look into a private company’s proposed joint venture with the Bacolod City Water District (Baciwa).
Like the Baciwa employees’ union, the Utility Consumers Alliance of Negros (UCAN) believes the joint venture will lead to the water district’s privatization.
Metro Pacific Water Investment Corp. offered to rehabilitate Baciwa’s distribution line within 30 years under a build-operate-transfer scheme.
This week, UCAN will send a request for inquiry to the city council and a position paper to the water district.
“No matter how they call it, the unsolicited proposal of Metropac is leading to privatization,” said the group’s counsel, Vicente Petierre III.
The employees’ union already expressed opposition to the proposal.
Metropac may eventually take over the water district and this will lead to higher water rates, claimed its president, Claudio Salmo.
Salmo had said Baciwa general manager Mario Macatangay invited him and other union officers to discuss the “unsolicited proposal.”
Upon learning this, UCAN president Ernie Larida called for an emergency meeting on Sept. 23, said the lawyer.
Petierre said they wanted Baciwa to provide them a copy of the proposal and a financial statement covering the past five years.
Metropac will not pitch the project without knowing where Baciwa stands fiscally, he stressed.
According to Petierre, privatization exposes consumers to profiteering.
“UCAN thinks it is time for the city government to intervene,” he said.
The employees also took issue with the alleged 80 percent and 20 percent income sharing between Metropac and Baciwa, respectively, under the proposed joint venture.
Salmo had warned this may cause all Baciwa employees to resign and leave the Board of Directors behind.
He stressed the union wants better service for consumers, and that includes reasonable rates. “They (Metropac) are profit-oriented [and] not [into] public service,” said Salmo.
Baciwa director David Villanueva had said he is open to the proposal.
“Our problems will be solved only if we have enough financial resources,” which Metropac could provide, he said.
Baciwa is bugged by numerous problems, including water supply shortage, systems losses, and broken and contaminated pipes.
According to Mayor Evelio Leonardia, the proposal needs to be “studied very well.”
Vice Mayor El Cid Familiaran, on the other hand, said any move toward privatization will affect the consumers first./PN
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