DINGALAN, Aurora—This third-class, 54-year-old municipality wants out of its mother province and is eyeing to join Nueva Ecija—or at least its power grid—over electricity woes.
This after the Sangguniang Bayan and the village councils of all its 11 barangays passed resolutions requesting the management of the Nueva Ecija II Electric Cooperative or Neeco II to assist in the transfer of their electricity services from the Aurora Electric Cooperative or Aurelco, citing the latter’s “poor performance and exorbitant power rates.”
In SB Resolution 2017-227 passed during the 25th regular session of the 17th municipal council, the town councilors asked Ramon M. de Vera, general manager of Neeco 2, Area 2 based in San Leonardo, Nueva Ecija, to facilitate the transfer of electric services to its cooperative instead of Aurelco, which supplies power to this town and seven others in Aurora.
The resolution noted that Dingalan Mayor Shierwin H. Taay has expressed dismay over the “inefficient services” of Aurelco, a stand supported by the SB. Authored by Taay’s sister, Councilor Shiela Taay, the resolution was signed by its presiding officer, Vice Mayor Edgardo R. Galvez.
The move comes eight months after Taay expressed his personal preference for the town to be annexed to Nueva Ecija from Aurora, because of the distance of the town from the respective provincial capitols. From here, the Aurora Capitol is three hours away in Baler, while the Nueva Ecija Capitol is an hour’s drive to Palayan City.
Local media have dubbed this planned move an “Aurexit,” after “Brexit” or Britain’s exit from the European Union.
Officials of Aurelco could not be reached for comment at presstime.
The barangay councils in Aplaya, Butas na Bato, Caragsacan, Davildavilan, Dikapanikian, Ibuna, Matawe, Paltic, Poblacion, Tanawan and Umiray also passed their respective resolutions seeking to move out of Aurelco and to Neeco 2.
The Association of Barangay Chairmen in Dingalan, led by its president Vic Maneja of Barangay Caragsacan, supported the move. They cited Aurelco’s “high power rates, inadequate and unstable power supply, fluctuating current which damages appliances, slow response to consumer complaints, disorderly installation of electric posts and wires, erroneous meter reading and questionable computation of bill consumption,” among others.
Aurelco collects P15 per kilowatthour of electricity compared with P8.10 per kwh for Neeco 2, which covers the Nueva Ecija towns of Bongabon, Gabaldon, Gen. Natividad, Gen. Tinio, Laur, Llanera, Peñaranda, Rizal, San Leonardo, Sta. Rosa, and Palayan City.
The village councils also said Neeco 2 used to provide electricity to this town since 1997, but this was transferred to Aurelco in 2000 even though the former’s performance “was a lot more satisfactory.”
The move to transfer to Neeco 2’s coverage came three months after Taay complained to Aurelco management for erroneous readings in its billing for the electrical consumption of a municipal government-run ice plant last November.
Taay told Aurelco general manager Noel Vedad to explain why its statement of account contained several discrepancies in its November billing for the ice plant in Barangay Aplaya.
The mayor noted that when the municipal accounting officer reviewed the SOA issued by Aurelco, the stated consumption in November was equivalent to 319 kwh. But on another SOA, it stated the consumption was 12,760 kwh, or a difference of 12,441 kwh.
Taay said when the issue was first brought to Aurelco’s attention, its engineer Peter Liwag took the original SOA and replaced it with another SOA to rectify the error. The net consumption was changed to 252 kwh used. But the new SOA showed a discrepancy of 9,828 kwh used.
Taay sought a review of all previous SOAs of the town. He expressed concern that Aurelco may have also committed erroneous computations of the billings of its household consumers in the town.
The 36-year-old Aurelco services this town and the municipalities of Baler, Casiguran, Dilasag, Dinalungan, Dipaculao, Maria Aurora and San Luis. It has 45,928 member consumers.
Aurelco has been repeatedly criticized in the past for its poor performance despite receiving a P159-million subsidy and a P41-million loan from the National Electrification Administration (NEA).