Looming power crisis must be on top of agenda of poll winners, says NGO

Whoever will be elected president must immediately get down to work to address the looming power crisis.

This was the challenge aired by Antonio G. Hombrebueno, chairman of the non-government organization Foundation for National Development (FND).

The just concluded elections, where brownouts occurred in many places of the country, "showed how vulnerable our power supply is," Hombrebueno said.

"If President Arroyo is re-elected, she should lose no time in overhauling the policy infrastructure of her government, especially the energy department, which has scared off potential investors in the power sector," Hombrebueno said.

The group added that, if the presidential rival gets the mandate, "he must immediately prove his political will to address the looming power crisis, never mind if he disappoints those in his party who pandered to the populist sentiment of some people in order to get elected. "Long drawn brownouts will bring our country down, industries will grind to a halt – and the new president will have to face the collective anger of an aggrieved populace," Hombrebueno warned.

One way to address the looming power crisis, according to the foundation, is for government to immediately undertake a comprehensive implementation of the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA). EPIRA sought to institute broad reforms in the power industry. Its main aim is to create an environment conducive to more private sector investments in power and the full privatization of the National Power Corp. (Napocor).

"It’s a sad case of a good law not being implemented properly. Failure to implement EPIRA according to its original intent will mean continuously draining the government of its limited funding resources. These could have been used to augment the dwindling budgets earmarked for health and education – the main tools for poverty alleviation," Hombrebueno stressed.

At present, the government can no longer afford to build and contract for new power plants simply because the state-owned Napocor is heavily saddled with an accumulated debt of almost $10 billion, and is bleeding with losses worth P100 billion annually.

Hombrebueno said several studies showed that if the demand for new capacity is not adequately and immediately addressed, recurring long brownouts, could hit Luzon by as easily as 2006.