Basketball can be a good metaphor for the current power situation in Occidental Mindoro. Take it from Engr. Omar Costibolo. He accurately utilized that analogy to describe how the dreaded Emergency Power Supply Agreement (EPSA) came into our existence with the alleged collusion between the National Electrification Administration (NEA), the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC), and the National Power Corporation (NPC).
Basketball, like any other game, is at times riddled with anomalies and scandals.
Sports as Simile
Basketball requires skill and determination but sometimes they are ruined by evil, vested, and suspicious interests. In every sports competition, history can attest that there can be anomalies and scandals that are too many to mention here that require another blog entry.
Together with my esteemed buddy, Rey San Jose, Costibolo posted a video on his Facebook Account last March 4, 2024, criticizing the EPSA telling their viewers that the Agreement has been dubious, questionable, and illegal since its inception. He compares it to a basketball match where Occidental Mindoro Electric Cooperative (OMECO) and the Occidental Mindoro Consolidated Power Corporation (OMCPC) as opponents and rivals. The game itself, according to them, is rigged with irregularities.
In such a fantasy game, the ERC instead of truthfully refereeing the match, changed the rules in midgame and was biased favoring OMCPC. OMECO’s coach, the NEA headed by its Administrator, instead of helping the team and guiding them to victory, according to Costibolo, made a treacherous move telling the team to withdraw and give the game on the silver platter to OMCPC and breaking all the rules,- hook, line and sinker. Therefore, the electric cooperative and its Consumers (MCOs) are sacrificed on the altar of capitalistic greed, and lies are fried in their own oil.
A Game fixed
Lest we forget that on July 13, 2023, Administrator Antonio Mariano "Nani" C. Almeda issued a directive to OMECO BOD to withdraw its Joint Application with the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) for the approval of the SAMARICA Power Supply Agreement (PSA) and instead enter into a negotiated Emergency Power Supply Agreement (EPSA) a pass-on scheme payment without subsidy from the government. This is how our coach fixed our game against the lone power provider in the province, so to speak.
And the leaders and their lapdogs along with the power provider hailed to high heavens this suspicious move of the coach. Those who insisted the illegal EPSA was praised like a messiah.
Under that illegal EPSA, the electricity coming from OMCPC's SAMARICA plant is presently paid by MCOs at its total cost or the unreasonably ridiculous True Cost Generation Rate (TCGR) reaching P16.67 to P20.70 per kilowatt hour (kWh) based on the P53.57 cost of crude oil. The EPSA squelched our hard-earned money as our coaching staff betrayed the whole team.
What followed was a metaphorically game-fixing galore!
Known Basketball Scandals
First is the scandal involving the NBA referee Tim Donaghy which was considered as the league’s most shameful tale on how the referee was involved in organized crime, just like the power regulator we have mentioned above. Donaghy swung games, including playoff series, where he bet on games that he officiated during his last two seasons and he made calls that affected the point spread in those games.
Donaghy alleged in a statement through his lawyers that several series in the NBA Playoffs had been improperly refereed according to the NBA's instructions. He alluded specifically to a playoff game where personal fouls were ignored even when they occurred in full view of the referees because it was in the NBA's interest to add another game to the series.
Hearing Costibolo and San Jose, this scandal came to mind. This is somewhat similar to how the ref errs in such EPSA and PSA handling.
What a shame!
Here's another:
In 1997, at a Golden State Warriors practice, Latrell Sprewell, known around the league for his volatile play and incidents off the court, got into it with his head coach PJ Carlesimo, and violently strangled him out.
If we are constantly sold out by our very coach to our opponents or rival team, isn’t it honorable to do a Latrell Sprewell? At least, in an analogical and subtle way.
A Cagefest?
So to this day, we are still in the quagmire of basic supply problems and high electrical rates. While other countries in Asia are already responding to the technological increase in the level and the increase in the quality of electrical service, here in the Philippines we are still trapped in the matter of price and uncertainty in our power industry.
Many of the team owners are even lambasting our team members and the team as a whole favoring the opposing squad by taking sides with the disloyal coach and even wanting to disband the team, calling each star player to walk out of the game or letting the other rival team win by default or for the MCOs to generally surrender. Such a call is idiotic and self-destructive. Unless of course one has a vested business interest and wants to capitalize on such a lasting chaos.
Again, we must launch discussions and public actions for the examination of the matter. Brownouts and unfair electric costs are both scandalous and evil putting the MCOs in hellish situations.
Until then we shall be caged in this allegorical basketball league? Until when will we believe the false hope that their lackeys are feeding us?
Eternal Ball Game
On February 27, 2024, the ERC issued an Order on Case No. 2023-045 RC. Cited in it is the Petition to Intervene with Comment filed by Costibolo.
The instruction brought temporary relief for it will lessen the cost of electricity from P16.67 to P20.70 per kilowatt hour (kWh) based on the P53.57 cost of crude oil, it will go down to 6.9520 Subsidized Approved Generation Rate (SAGR). Under the Order, the OMCPC will also get the Universal Charge for Missionary Electrification (UCME) subsidy billing. This is the move that the OMCPC has aimed for from the start.
The SAGR will not be enjoyed immediately. The expensive charging under EPSA is until May 2024. The excess charges put on to MCOs cannot be refunded at once and it may take until next year.
The ERC is still dribbling the issue between the dubious and illegal EPSA and the SAMARICA-PSA which is more valid and legal. In this regard, there is no reason to celebrate.
ERC’s latest Order [Case No. 045-RC] gives us, MCOs no reason to rejoice. This is just a band-aid solution.
ERC should have declared EPSA illegal from the start and ordered a refund of all the amount unjustly collected from us.
The MCOs are still on the losing end. What about if OMCPC files a protest against the very low ERC-approved True Cost Generation Rate or TCGR which is very likely? The MCOs will again be threatened by brown-outs until the ERC reconsiders their Order for sure. It’s a case of history repeating itself. We already have seen this before.
Joe Cantada, the late PBA legendary sportscaster, classic line says it all: An eternity of basketball is [still]ahead of us.
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References:
https://www.ranker.com/list/biggest-nba-scandals-all-time/patrick-alexander
https://www.facebook.com/omar.costibolo/videos/1186095079466486/?_rdc=1&_rdr
Photo: IndyStar
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