THE Bacolod City Council approved a resolution expressing strong opposition to the increase of electricity rates of the Central Negros Electric Cooperative (Ceneco) and to request the regulatory commission to look into this matter and take the necessary action to stop the same.

The resolution which was authored by Councilor Simplicia Distrito, chairperson of the City Council committee on human resource and development, was approved during the regular session yesterday.

Distrito said it is the duty of the Local Government Unit to uphold the welfare of its people.

“Last month, complaints about the sudden increase of electricity bills flooded social media platforms and even reached our offices,” she said.

Distrito noted that Ceneco recently announced that they have increased their power rate by P0.53 or from P 10.6608 to P 11.1923 per kilowatt hour (kWh).

“Although Ceneo has its reasons for the increase yet the timing in doing the same is inappropriate considering that all of us are still under crisis brought by the pandemic. Most of us had just returned to work with very unstable income to spare for the increase in power rate,” Distrito said.

She said the neighboring power distributors, Northern Negros Electric Cooperative (Noneco) and Negros Occidental Electric Cooperative (Noceco) announced much lower power rates than Ceneco.

She added that Noneco decreased its power rate from P 10.7937 last April to P 10.1698 per kWh this May or a lowering of P 0.6240 while Noceco decreased from P9. 0565 last April to P8. 5426 this May that is P0.5139 lower.

“Ceneco has to see it once again and give more weight to the fact that our constituents have carried so much burden while the pandemic is going on and instead of imposing additional load, they should have looked for ways to ease and give its member-consumers the humanitarian consideration that they deserve,” Distrito said.

She said the Energy Regulatory Commission is also requested to look into this matter and take the necessary action that will consider the plight of the member-consumers of Ceneco whose income are greatly affected by the coronavirus disease pandemic.