Congress must review NGCP franchise for failure to secure electricity supply

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Kuryente.Org, an electricity consumer rights and welfare organization considers the recent announcement of the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines’ (NGCP) of a possible power outages this summer is a clear cover-up for its long time negligence to fulfill its obligation to timely secure a reliable ancillary power service agreement. The consumer organization is calling on the Congress to review NGCP’s franchise.

Roland Vibal, National Coordinator of Kuryente.org, said:

“We call on the House of Representatives to review NGCP’s franchise if the corporation can’t live-up to its obligations to secure a reliable electricity supply to the consuming public. The Energy Regulation Commission (ERC) must consider NGCP’s poor performance as they deliberate NGCP’s call for transmission rate increase in the on-going 4th regulatory review.

“NGCP is playing the blame game to cover its continued negligence to secure a reliable ancillary services agreement as per DOE Circular No. 2019-12-0018. Yet, despite the order, the NGCP continuously failed to comply and continued with its month-on-month ancillary services which the DOE considers as a non-firm agreement that cannot be relied on.

“They claim that they are now in the process of finalizing the Ancillary Service Procurement Agreement (ASPA) based on Competitive Selection. This is a belated move. Their failure to act timely to its obligation is why the public will suffer from the project power outages.

“NGCP must fulfill its responsibility and be accountable for its failure and negligence.”