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Those
who are suggesting that the grilling of the officials of
the Joint Foreign Chambers of Commerce (JFC) at the
Senate on Friday was an “overkill” are more interested
in pleasing members of that lobby group and their
cohorts, in and out of government, than seriously
searching for ways to lower the unconscionable cost of
our electric rates, which is now second only to Japan,
the world’s second-biggest economy.
They
should be exposed for what they are—bottom kissers for
the most rapacious group of predators in business suits
this country has been tolerating for years on end.
By
advocating for a full and unabridged implementation of
the flawed Electric Power Industry Reform Act (Epira) to
avoid “sending the wrong signals to investors,” these
guys are playing into the hands of these operators who
simply want to fry us over in our own lard as many times
as they please, probably until hell freezes over. We
cannot and should not allow that to happen any longer.
That
Senate grilling was necessary to put these guys on
notice that their open, naked and contemptuous
interference in our affairs will no longer be tolerated.
It is time to tell them that the public has seen through
the flawed and dangerous messages they are trying to
purvey with their increasingly aggressive
letter-writing.
As Sens.
Juan Ponce Enrile, Miriam Defensor Santiago and Joker
Arroyo correctly pointed out, their kind of sly
posturings will not be taken kindly even in their own
countries, so why should they be allowed to do that kind
of thing in the Philippines, even as they have been
afforded the “hospitality of the house,” so to speak,
for such a long, long time?
Just in
case the appeasers in our midst lost the point in this
latest uproar over foreign interference in our domestic
affairs, they should be directed to the text and call-in
messages which most radio shows got that fateful Friday
after news of the tongue-lashing at the Senate was
broadcast.
The
public was almost unanimous in applauding the Senate
action, especially after Senator Enrile asked the JFC
officials to name the “legislators making unwarranted
accusations before the President,” which they failed to
do.
It would
appear that the JFC got too protective of the profits
their sponsors, both local and foreign, entrenched in
the cozy and secretive power-industry club were getting
from the questionable “take-or-pay” and other burdensome
provisions the power purchase agreements (PPAs) entered
into with the independent power producers (IPPs). Same
with the unexplained “system losses” and “pass-ons”
which they had long endorsed but which have been found
to be unfair and burdensome to the consuming public that
they forgot their manners and their thought processes
altogether.
The
public’s beef, if we may call it such, is simple: a) why
insist on implementing a flawed law in the guise of
letting its full flowering come to pass, and b) why
endorse the quick and untrammeled privatization of
government assets in a critical sector, such as power on
so-called antimonopoly grounds, while endorsing the kind
of quasimonopolies like Meralco and First Holdings and,
to a certain extent, Veco, Davao Light and Aboitiz
Power?
Indeed,
the intense public debate over Manila Electric Co. (Meralco)
and, yes, the Lopezes’ practices and views on the power
industry brought about by the corporate battle in
Meralco, has brought to closer public scrutiny the many
flaws and unwholesome practices which have stood in the
way of lower electric rates.
It has
exposed the cartelized greed and the washed-out
justifications employed by the big powers in the
industry to burden the public even more. Sadly, it has
also confirmed the capture of the regulatory process by
these same players, which can only be corrected by
amending the law and opening up the entire process to
even greater scrutiny.
By
issuing that belated appeal for the government to stop
the clock, as it were, despite the burdens on everyone,
including their members, the JFC guys merely confirmed
they have become part of the entire problem and not a
solution at all. To them and their cohorts, we can only
say: Tama na, sobra na!
SBMA’S
haul
Speaking
of tama na (enough), it is well that Subic Bay
Metropolitan Administration (SBMA) management together,
with the residential Antismuggling Group (PASG) and
Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (Pdea) has acted with
dispatch in hunting Anthony “Anton” Ang and closing his
company, Hualong International, after intercepting that
multibillion-peso shabu shipment which Ang and company
tried to sneak out through the free port.
We are
told that if not for that chance flag-down by operatives
of the SBMA Task Force Bukas Kotse of a Mitsubishi
Outlander at the Riviera pier within the Ship Repair
Facility (SRF) compound, the whole shipment would have
been readily transported out of Subic into the waiting
arms of drug addicts all over the country.
It
appears that the van was waiting for some “boxes” which
were later found to be shabu being transferred from a
Taiwanese vessel, F/B Shun Fa Shing, which were declared
as “sensitive computer parts” even as the vessel was
issued an inward manifest by the Bureau of Customs in
Subic as “nil cargo” (without any cargo).
That was
the inconsistency the operatives used to pounce on the
van and the vessel (Is it still under SBMA hold-order?)
after the occupants tried to resist any scrutiny. That
indiscretion led to the discovery of additional boxes in
the Hualong warehouse and in other parked vehicles
within the free port presumably used by Ang and company
to disperse the shabu haul.
That
these shabu shipments—the latest just two days ago—have
been intercepted is good news indeed. The question—and
this is something which SBMA CEO Armand Arreza, PASG,
Customs and Pdea have to answer—is: Has Ang been in the
business since he registered Hualong and subleased that
warehouse for the “transhipment, importing, exporting,
warehousing and cargo consolidation of cigarettes and
liquor” in 2003?
There
are reports that Ang has been mixing his legitimate
operations with shabu trading three years ago after
successfully working his way through the free port’s
rigid procedures for two years. He has managed to keep
“clean” in the first two years and then ventured into
the shadowy world of shabu trading at the time the SBMA
was enmeshed in other controversies, including the
intense intramurals among its officials.
For,
apart from the grave misuse of SBMA facilities and loss
of revenues in the process, these kinds of practices put
the entire free-port system under a cloud. That kind of
negative workout should be of concern not only to the
SBMA but to other free ports or special economic zones,
including those being supervised by the Philippine
Export Zone Authority, as the enterprises in these areas
have, as a matter of course, been given more leeway in
the conduct of their businesses. It is clear that
intense monitoring and audit of their activities and the
operations within these areas are in order.
Tet’s
audit
Since we
are in the business of auditing and generating more
revenues for the government, Malacañang and the
Department of Finance should probably take a second look
at the suggestions earlier issued by
then-representative, now Bataan Gov. Enrique “Tet”
Garcia Jr. on how to precisely do so in many simple
ways.
One such
way which has earned the government billions of pesos
was the immediate posting of Bureau of Internal Revenue
(BIR), Bureau of Customs (BOC) and other payments due
the government being coursed through the banking system
under the account of these agencies by the simple adding
of a column in the daily reporting forms of all banks
and financial units.
That
daily posting immediately put a stop to the notorious
practice of the syndicates intercepting the payments,
with the help of corrupt bank employees, and the runners
of the paying enterprises themselves through the
expedient of opening ghost accounts side by side those
maintained by the BIR, BOC and other government units,
which were used to drain the unposted amounts on a
regular basis.
There
are a number of other ways to improve revenue collection
which Tet Garcia has been trying to get the government
to look into.
These
include a review of the value-added tax system as
compared with the specific-tax mode, an
honest-to-goodness audit of the books of the oil and
power companies and the reconciliation and improvement
of tax powers of local government units (LGUs) with
national government initiatives to avoid duplication and
burdensome workouts.
He also
has some ideas on how government-owned and -controlled
corporations and the newly found LGU enterprise centers
can best be harnessed to enhance productivity, increase
incomes and provide better and more affordable public
services.
If
Finance Secretary Gary Teves and his boys will find time
soon to exchange notes with Garcia on these and other
matters of mutual concern, the public may well have
another bonanza to look forward to. |
