Thursday, January 15, 2009 Ceneco management decides on power disconnection By Merlinda A. Pedrosa
CENTRAL Negros Electric Cooperative (Ceneco) president Vicente Sabornay clarified Wednesday that the physical disconnection of City Hall's power supply was decided by the electric cooperative's management.
Sabornay said the management, as a rule, only acts based on the authority granted by the Ceneco Board.
Sabornay was reacting to an open letter coming from three members of the Ceneco Board of Directors, which said "the actual or physical disconnection of City Hall’s power supply last January 8 was decided by the other members of the Ceneco Board of Directors and the OIC general manager."
District I director Luis Cuneca, District IV's Edward Gasambelo and District VII's Roberto Montelibano, former Ceneco president, claimed that two Board resolutions were passed last July 8, 2008 - Resolutions 8211 and 8212 - stating that the scheduled power disconnection of Bacolod City government offices was overridden by the compromise agreement signed by the city and Ceneco (when Montelibano was still president) before the sala of Judge Gorgonio Ybañez last October 31, 2008.
Sabornay said as early as July, they already know the impending possible action against City Hall. "It so happened that the management decided to effect the disconnection after so many months" of waiting for the city to pay its electricity bill.
Last January 8, the board was supposed to have a regular meeting when the three concerned directors said they were surprised upon learning that the actual or physical disconnection was already effected at City Hall. This is the reason the admin building of the power coop was padlocked.
The open letter said: "the physical disconnection was performed without their knowledge and it entails a contingency plan for crisis management and a necessary budget in case there are unexpected line faults and assignment of personnel to various areas for purposes of emergency responses. Since there was none, Ceneco operations management was not prepared in responding to emergency calls, resulting in prolonged massive brownout last Friday."
But Sabornay said: "probably, the Ceneco management was not able to reach them (directors) about the City Hall disconnection." He said Ceneco was also prepared to act on the emergency calls, "but how can the Ceneco act efficiently when the operation was totally paralyzed?"
He said what's important is that the board already authorized the execution as early as July last year.
Meanwhile, Vice Mayor Jude Thaddeus Sayson said even though the three directors were just the minority, he didn't know how many Ceneco Board directors voted for the City Hall disconnection "because they are saying there was a Board resolution which I have not seen until now."
He believed that no Board meeting happened on the planned physical disconnection.
Sayson said he supports the statement of City Legal officer Allan Zamora that there was no notice of disconnection. "Instead, the city received a demand letter, demanding payments from the city."
