More Electric and Power Corp. asked the Energy Regulatory Commission to deny the appeal of Panay Electric Co. to reinstate its provisional certificate of public convenience and necessity.
MORE Power said in a statement it was opposing PECO’s supplemental motion filed with the ERC as the latter had shown total disregard of consumer interests.
“The deterioration of the distribution system of PECO accelerated during the one-year period when PECO, using all sorts of dilatory actions in the various courts, delayed the issuance and implementation of the writ of possession for the takeover of the distribution by MORE,” MORE Power said.
“During that one-year period PECO ran the distribution to the ground with little or no rehabilitation or maintenance. Many parts of the aging system were overheating and bursting into flames on a regular basis,” it said.
MORE Power said the former distribution utility of Iloilo City also showed grave abuse of the courts for filing different legal cases to bar the full takeover by the new congressional franchisee as the city’s new power utility through the expropriation of the distribution system.
The company informed ERC that PECO continued to send monthly bills to Iloilo customers despite losing its provisional CPCN.
MORE Power said the Iloilo City government had already revoked PECO’s business permit, making its activities related to the operation of the distribution system highly illegal.
It said PECO also does not have a franchise and is no longer a legitimate CPCN holder.
President Rodrigo Duterte signedRepublic Act No. 11212 on Feb. 14, 2019 granting MORE Power the franchise to operate a distribution utility a few weeks before PECO’s franchise expired.
MORE Power also said PECO’s failure to do preventive maintenance left the distribution system “rotting, decrepit, and a ticking time bomb.”
The company said the current state of disrepair of Iloilo City’s distribution system that MORE Power tries to solve with preventive maintenance operations is the real cause of the numerous power outages, contrary to PECO’s claim of MORE Power’s lack of experience and the expertise to run an electricity distribution system.