SONA 2010: Water, power crises

Aquino just inherited from previous administrations the country’s water and power insecurity but the challenge is will he overhaul the existing policy framework that has allowed the privatization and deregulation of the country’s utility sectors and created the mess we are in right now? (Photo from Reuters/Cheryl Ravelo)

First published by the Philippine Online Chronicles

Part 1

President Benigno Aquino III will hold his first State of the Nation Address (SONA) on Monday, July 26 amid a water shortage engulfing a substantial portion of Metro Manila, with long queues for rationed water becoming a common sight.

Meanwhile, about two weeks ago, around the same time when the Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) announced another rate hike, a brownout hit the President’s residence at Times Street in Quezon City which he blamed for arriving late for an appointment. Rotating brownouts have been just as frequent as power rate hikes in the past couple of months.

“Wala nang kuryente, wala pang tubig, ang taas pa ng singil” is the common man’s complaint.

The double whammy of water and power crises, of supply disruptions and skyrocketing rates is being felt not only in the metropolis but nationwide. Government officials and private utilities have pinned the blame squarely on force ma jeure like the prolonged dry spell and slow dam replenishment due to lack of enough rains.

However, there are obvious policy issues that the latest episodes in water and power supply insecurity have brought to the fore. Considering their immediate and long-term effects on the people’s welfare and overall economic development, Aquino is expected by the public and policy makers to outline in his SONA how the administration plans to address these recurring problems.

Magnitude of the water shortage

According to the latest update from the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), 344 barangays (villages) with close to 3 million people in the service area of Maynilad Water Services Inc. are already affected by the water shortage. The number is almost half (49 percent) of the entire West Zone concession area of Maynilad, which together with its East Zone counterpart Manila Water Co. Inc., took over the water distribution function of the privatized Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) in 1997.

Maynilad chief operating officer Herbert Consunji disclosed that as of July 20, at least 18 percent (equivalent to some 450,000 people) of those affected by the water shortage in the West Zone can be considered as “severely affected”. This means that these areas have available water supply for only up to six hours at most or none at all.

In an earlier advisory posted on its website, Maynilad said that among those severely affected are 22 barangays in Quezon City, 13 barangays in Caloocan City, 4 barangays in Malabon, 4 barangays in Valenzuela City, 2 barangays in Las Pinas City, and 1 barangay in Navotas. The Pangilinan-Consunji-controlled water utility has already deployed 28 tankers to ration water in these areas. Reports say that residents are forced to line up as early as 5 AM and wait for Maynilad’s tankers.

In the service area of Manila Water, a smaller 21 percent is being affected by the water shortage, according to DPWH Secretary Rogelio Singson as quoted in a news report. The Ayala-led water firm in a separate report admitted that there is already a gradual reduction in water pressure in elevated within its concession area such as in parts of Pasig, Marikina, Cainta, Rodriguez, Taguig, and San Mateo in Rizal province. Manila Water may also have to resort to water rationing if the water level in Angat Dam – where they and Maynilad get 97 percent of their water supply for the domestic needs of Metro Manila and parts of Cavite and Rizal – will not improve in the coming months.

Blame it on the (lack of) rain

Due to a depleted water level because of the El Niño phenomenon, the private water concessionaires said that their water allocation from Angat Dam has substantially declined. DPWH reported that at present, Maynilad is actually receiving 1,800 million liters per day from Angat Dam, down from its normal level of 2,400 million liters per day (a 33.3 percent reduction). Manila Water, on the other hand, has seen its allocation dwindle to 1,245 million liters per day from 1,600 million liters per day, or a 28.5 percent reduction.

Latest update from the MWSS on the water level in Angat Dam pegged it at

Among the many promises of water privatization was 24/7 access to water for all (Photo from Raffy Lerma)

158.2 meters above sea level (masl) as of July 21. A day before that, it dropped to 157.56 masl, lower than its historic low of 158.15 masl in September 1998 which was also an El Niño year. Authorities said that recent typhoons “Basyang” and “Caloy” did not substantially replenish Angat Dam, adding up a combined 27 centimeters only. The critical level of Angat Dam is pegged at 180 masl, which was breached in April during the height of the latest El Niño. Without heavy rains, the dam’s water is expected to further recede to 147 masl by September. At 120 masl, the dam could no longer provide water for Metro Manila’s domestic consumption.

Rotating brownouts, power rate hikes

The lack of rains and depleting water level in the country’s major dams because of the El Niño have also been blamed for the power crisis – characterized by rotating brownouts and spikes in electricity rates – that has hit the country this year. In March, the power supply deficits reached record highs with Luzon experiencing a shortfall of 641 megawatts (MW) and Mindanao, 700 MW, according to the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP).

Meralco had to implement a 90-minute power supply disruption throughout the day because of the supposed deficiency in available electricity. In Mindanao, blackouts have lasted by up to 12 hours a day, a situation that began as early as February. The southern island heavily depends on hydro power for its electricity needs, with hydropower plants accounting for 53.1 percent of Mindanao’s generating capacity, according to data from the Mindanao Economic Development Council (MEDCO).

But low water levels derailed the operation of these power plants. The 727-MW Agus and 255-MW Pulangi hydroelectric power plants, for instance, experienced an 80 and 90 percent reduction in capacity, respectively because of the prolonged drought. The water level in Lake Lanao, source for most of the hydropower plants in Mindanao, has breached its critical level of 699.15 meters in early March and dropped to 699.08 meters.

In addition, reduced power supply due to depleted dams amid high electricity consumption because of the hot temperature brought about by El Niño has also pushed up power rates throughout the country. Meralco, for example, has increased its rates several times in the past six months, with the latest rate hike of 5.8 centavos per kilowatt-hour (kWh) announced in the first week of July, supposedly because of high generation charges at the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM). Overall, Meralco’s generation charge has already jumped by P1.84 per kWh between January and July.

Part 2

The double whammy of water and power crises – major issues that require urgent response and actions from President Benigno Aquino III

Policy issues

While the private companies and government agencies concerned have conveniently blamed natural phenomenon for the water and power crises, a deeper look will show that the conditions for the crises have been laid out and at the same time aggravated by wrong policies.

Both the water and power sectors have been deeply privatized, a process that was set off by Aquino’s mother, the late President Corazon Aquino in the late 1980s, accelerated by the Ramos and Estrada administrations in the 1990s, then continued and intensified by former President and now Pampanga Representative Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Among the many promises made by the private water concessionaires and hyped by the then Ramos administration to justify the privatization of the MWSS was upgrading the decrepit water system infrastructure. Such upgrade intends to substantially reduce non-revenue water (NRW, or water lost due to leaks and pilferage) and help achieve universal and 24/7 water supply for an increasing number of households. In their original concession agreement with MWSS, the private water firms promised to provide universal access by 2001.

But until today, less than 60 percent of 790,000 households in Maynilad’s service area have 24-hour water service while only 74 percent receive water at 7-pound per square inch (PSI) or stronger pressure. More than half (53 percent) of water allocated to Maynilad continues to get wasted because of leaks and pilferage. Meanwhile, Manila Water, claims 99 percent water supply coverage in its service area but will not say how big the portion is with individual and direct household connection and those serviced by private water suppliers or “middlemen”. These areas served by a third party private contractor are often poor communities and most vulnerable to water supply disruption.

Amid water supply problems, Maynilad and Manila Water jacked up their rates tremendously, taking advantage of full-cost recovery mechanisms offered by privatization. Since MWSS was privatized, Maynilad’s basic charge has already soared by 449 percent and Manila Water, by 845 percent.

Private monopolies and manipulation

The power crisis that the country has been facing is also more man-made than natural. Plant shutdowns and supposed fuel constraints have combined with the impact of depleted dams on hydropower generation to substantially constrict available capacity throughout the islands. The implementation of Republic Act (RA) 9136 or the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (Epira) of 2001, which facilitated the privatization of power generation and transmission as well as deregulated the setting of power rates, has not addressed the country’s energy security issues.

Under Epira, hydro and other power plants have been privatized and sold to foreign and local firms (Photo from napocor.gov.ph)

Epira merely transferred the state monopoly on power to private companies, which has set the stage for various forms of possible abuses and manipulation. Cross-ownership, for instance, between distributors like Meralco and power producers made electricity rates more blurred than transparent.

Take the case of the WESM, which Epira created to supposedly allow freer competition among industry players but in fact has become a venue for speculation and rigging of prices. Among the so-called independent power producers (IPPs) trading in the WESM is First Gen Power Corp. that runs two natural gas-fired power plants (1,000-MW Sta. Rita and 500-MW San Lorenzo) and two hydropower plants (100-MW Pantabangan and 12-MW Masiway). The Lopez family, which controls 13.4 percent of Meralco, owns First Gen which aside from the WESM transactions also supplies 35.7 percent of Meralco’s power requirements.

Plant shutdowns

Furthermore, another Meralco owner, San Miguel Energy Corp. (SMEC) which has a 34-percent stake in the utility giant, also operates the biggest power plants in the country like the 620-MW Limay Combined Cycle Power Plant, the 1,000-MW Sual Coal-Fired Power Plant, and the 1,200-MW Ilijan Combined Cycle Power Plant. During the height of the El Niño, SMEC shut down, along with other privately operated plants, one unit of its Sual plant (with a capacity of 540 MW) due to “coal supply problems”. Its Limay plant also went offline for about three weeks early this year for “inspection purposes”.

The unscheduled outages in its power plants fueled talks that SMEC may have intentionally decommissioned the Sual and Limay to constrict power supply and jack up rates. After the SMEC plant shutdowns, First Gen followed suit with its own maintenance shutdown of its natural gas-fired Sta. Rita and San Lorenzo power plants in mid-February to early March.

The cost of generation has gone sky-high because of these plant shutdowns that artificially reduced available capacity. Meanwhile, power retailers like Meralco have been able to easily pass on the charges to unfortunate end-consumers. Under Epira, they are allowed to automatically adjust generation charges on a monthly basis through a cost recovery mechanism called Automatic Adjustment of Generation Rates (AGRA).

Is Noynoy up to the challenge?

Despite the recurring problems caused by its flawed policies on water and power, the previous Arroyo administration has continued the relentless march towards the neoliberal restructuring of these sectors. In fact, among what can be considered a midnight deal, is the April 28 bidding of the Angat Dam which was won by a South Korean power company. If this deal will be completed, consumers fear of more water supply woes even as the country’s energy needs are not necessarily guaranteed.

To be sure, President Aquino just inherited from previous administrations these problems besetting the country’s water and power security. The challenge, however, is will he overhaul the existing policy framework that has allowed the privatization and deregulation of the country’s utility sectors and created the mess we are in right now?

He will have the chance to do this in his first SONA on Monday when he outlines his vision for the country in the next six years. People who have been abused long enough by private water and power utilities, who suffered endless brownouts and lack of water amid skyrocketing monthly bills, will certainly be interested to listen.

Water shortage in Metro is beyond El Niño

A depleted Angat Dam (photo by Raffy Lerma)

The water shortage in Metro Manila has been conveniently blamed by the private water concessionaires and authorities on everything else but themselves. They blamed it on El Niño for drying up the Angat Dam. They blamed it on “Basyang” for not pouring enough rains on Norzagaray, Bulacan to replenish the dam’s water (read news report here).

But how much of the current shortage can be blamed on natural phenomenon and how much should be attributed to policy errors like water privatization? True, the prolonged dry spell depleted water to precarious levels not only in Angat but in several major dams around the country. The impact on domestic water supply in Metro Manila, however, could have been tolerable or at least not as bad as it is now if not for structural issues related to the privatization of the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) almost 13 years ago.

All-time low

According to the latest report, Angat Dam’s water, which supplies 97 percent of the domestic water needs of some 14 million people in Metro Manila and parts of Cavite and Rizal, has already dropped to an alarming 157.59 meters as of Sunday (July 18). This is an all-time low, with the previous record pegged at 158.15 meters recorded during the 1998 El Niño episode. The critical level of Angat Dam is 180 meters.

One of the private companies that took over the water distribution function of MWSS, Maynilad Water Services Inc., has already resorted to rationing water to some areas in its concession area. (Maynilad serves the West Zone of the old MWSS service area, while Manila Water Co. Inc. serves the East Zone)  Maynilad said that its water allocation has declined by 30 percent, causing supply disruptions since last week.

But many of these areas in Maynilad’s west zone have long been experiencing water supply problems even before the current El Niño. “Unfortunately, the reduction in our water allocation has forced us to ration water in elevated areas, in areas with a lot of water loss usually due to illegal connections, and in areas that need further service upgrade,” a Maynilad official said, describing the areas currently experiencing water supply disruption.

A failed policy

Among the many promises made by the private water concessionaires and hyped by the then Ramos administration was upgrading the decrepit water system infrastructure. Such upgrade intends to substantially reduce non-revenue water (NRW, or water lost due to leaks and pilferage) and help achieve universal and 24/7 water supply for an increasing number of households. In their original concession agreement with MWSS, the private water firms promised to provide universal access by 2001.

But until today, less than 60 percent of 790,000 households in Maynilad’s service area have 24-hour water service while only 74 percent receive water at 7-pound per square inch (PSI) or stronger pressure (read here). More than half (53 percent) of water allocated to Maynilad continues to get wasted because of leaks and pilferage (read here). Meanwhile, Manila Water, claims 99 percent water supply coverage in its service area but will not say how big the portion is with individual and direct household connection and those serviced by private water suppliers or “middlemen”. These areas served by a third party private contractor are often poor communities and most vulnerable to water supply disruption.

There is no available data that break down NRW into leaks and pilferage. But the continued pervasiveness of illegal connections may be explained by skyrocketing water bills due to full-cost recovery under water privatization. Since MWSS was privatized, Maynilad’s basic charge has already soared by 449 percent and Manila Water, by 845 percent. Put that in a situation of worsening job scarcity, stagnant wages and income, and rapid increases in the overall cost of living and you will get the picture. (See Chart)

 

Reverse privatization

Maynilad and Manila Water must be held accountable for failing to provide, after more than a decade of privatization, reliable and universal access to water for the people – a situation that has just been aggravated today by the El Niño.

Certainly, there is a need to reverse water privatization, a neoliberal policy that has already been discredited worldwide. Public control must be asserted especially over water which is not a simple commodity or service that we can afford to leave in the hands of profit-seeking companies.

The Aquino administration can start this by suspending the sale of the Angat Dam itself, which has been auctioned to a Korean power company last April. The further privatization of water through the sale of Angat Dam will mean worse water shortages in the coming months and years, with or without an El Niño.

These issues must be included in the medium-term policy agenda of the new administration.

Stopgap measures

But in the meantime, as a stopgap measure, Malacañang, the private concessionaires, MWSS, National Water Resources Board (NWRB) and other concerned government agencies must come out with a detailed plan on how they will ensure that water for domestic use will be available. Due focus must be given to vulnerable communities as they tend to be displaced under a privatized water system by well-off customers and commercial establishments even during times of abundant water supply.

Authorities must also strictly monitor and regulate the wasteful use of water by golf courses, malls, hotels, private parks, car wash shops, and other commercial establishments. An 18-hole golf course, for instance, consumes an average of 2.3 million liters of water per day, according to the United Nations (UN), causing an enormous impact on water withdrawals, and competing with the basic water needs of as much as 115,000 people.

Today is World Water(less) Day

"Water for the people now!"

Unknown to most Filipinos, today (March 22) is the international observance of the World Water Day. This initiative grew out of the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) better known as the Earth Summit held in Rio Janeiro, Brazil.

For this year, the theme is “Clean Water for a Healthy World”, with a campaign, said the UN, “to raise the profile of water quality at the political level so that water quality considerations are made alongside those of water quantity”.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), water, together with sanitation and hygiene, have important impacts on both health and disease. In a 2008 report, the WHO noted grim facts on the health situation in relation to access to water, to wit:

• 3.575 million people die each year from water-related disease
• 43 percent of water-related deaths are due to diarrhea
• 84 percent of water-related deaths are in children ages 0 – 14
• 98 percent of water-related deaths occur in the developing world

Meanwhile, a more recent (2010) report by the WHO and the United Nations  Children’s Fund (Unicef) noted disparities between countries, regions, and urban and rural areas in terms of access to sanitation:

• 2.6 billion people or 39 per cent of the world’s population live without access to improved sanitation. The vast majority live in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.
• In the developed regions almost the entire population (99 per cent) used improved facilities as compared to 52 per cent in developing regions.
• At current rates of progress the world will miss the MDG sanitation target by almost 1 billion people, which claims to: “halve, by 2015 the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation,” by 13 per cent. And the MDGs are not the end of the sanitation challenge. Even if the target is met some 1.7 billion people will still not have access to improved sanitation facilities.
• Rural/urban disparities are particularly apparent in sub-Saharan Africa, and the Caribbean, Southern Asia and Oceania where improved sanitation coverage is highest among the urban population despite the vast majority living in rural areas.
• 751 million people share their sanitation facilities with other households or only use public facilities.

Such appalling global reality is reflected in the Philippines where the poor have been increasingly deprived of access to water for basic domestic use due to neoliberal policies such as privatization of water services and resources. The situation continues to deteriorate today due to the El Niño that has further limited water supply available for the people, especially the poor.

According to the 2007 Annual Poverty Indicator Survey (APIS) of the National Statistics Office (NSO):

• 17.1 percent of all families in the country do not have access to safe drinking water and are forced to get water from unsafe sources such as unprotected well (5.7 percent); developed spring (4.8 percent); undeveloped spring (1.9 percent); river, stream, pond, lake or dam (1.1 percent); rainwater (0.4 percent); tanker truck or peddler (2.3 percent); and other sources (0.8 percent).
• Access to water is expectedly lower for poor families as the same NSO survey show that 30 percent of the poorest 30 percent of Filipino families do not have access to safe water supply.

The advocacy group Water for the People Network (WPN) intends to draw public attention to this situation of lack of access to water for basic domestic use and for people’s livelihood amid the El Niño and continuing privatization of the country’s water resources.

Tomorrow, March 23, the WPN will hold a roundtable discussion on Angat Dam’s privatization together with the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) and other stakeholders including farmers from Bulacan, consumers as well as water agencies including the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS).

More on the Angat Dam privatization and the WPN’s roundtable later.

Overpriced oil inflates costs of El Niño, power crisis

Petron and other oil firms have been jacking up pump prices in recent weeks (Photo from www.petronmarketing.com)

Those who are ready to absolve government for the harmful effects of El Niño should think again. While El Niño is a natural phenomenon, its impact on the people and the economy could have been eased by right government policies. Sadly, the policies in place have exposed the country not only to the strongest blows from what experts describe as a “moderate” El Niño. These flawed policies have also exposed us to El Niño’s magnified impact.

Deregulated, privatized energy

Take the case of power and oil – strategic sectors that have been privatized and deregulated by government. As the water level in dams around the country fell, hydropower generation also declined. Consequently, more power is generated from plants running on expensive and overpriced oil. To make the situation worse, oil prices have been on an uptrend again in the past few weeks. Electricity bills, which are also artificially bloated, climbed as a result. Prices of other commodities and services are sure to follow.

Such predicament could have been capably addressed by a government that has the needed policy tools. But it threw away these tools when it allowed private corporations to take control of the entire energy sector. It tried to reclaim some of these tools through emergency powers but was met with understandable public skepticism. In the end, the reality that Congress could not be convened at this point in the election season forced government to give up the plan.

As an alternative, government now intends to lease modular generating sets that could produce an additional 160 megawatts (MW) of electricity for Mindanao. By itself, this plan is already costly with an initial tab of P5.5 billion aside from increasing power rates in Mindanao by P14 per kilowatt-hour (kWh). But it is made even costlier by overpriced oil that will be used in great amounts to feed the generating sets.

Amid the El Niño, energy companies, with their greed and abuses un-moderated, are having a heyday.

P8.12 per liter overpricing

In the coming months, households not only in Mindanao will have to pay for higher electricity bills. The reason is not only the limited supply of cheaper hydropower due to El Niño. As more power is generated by oil-fed power plants, consumers also become more exposed to the impact of frequent oil price hikes and overpriced petroleum.

Under Republic Act (RA) 8479 or the Oil Deregulation Law of 1998, oil companies are allowed to increase pump prices at whim. They are not even required to inform the public about their price changes, much less explain their price hikes. This policy has been abused to the hilt by the oil firms. The National Economic Development Authority (Neda) itself has once confirmed that oil firms are indeed overpricing their products.

As of January 2010, oil products in the country are still overpriced by an average of P8.12 per liter. This figure is based on the monthly difference between the ideal and actual changes in pump prices from January 2008 to January 2010. The ideal pump price adjustment is computed using the difference in the monthly averages of Dubai crude and foreign exchange (forex) rate during the said period. The actual price movement, meanwhile, is based on the Department of Energy’s (DOE) monitoring.

There is no consolidated data yet on actual pump price movement for February and March. But note that in February, there should have been an 83-centavo per liter rollback based on Dubai crude and forex monthly movements. The actual pump price of diesel, however, did not move during the said month while kerosene prices even jumped by 25 centavos a liter. In other words, the overpricing could be much higher (aside from the fact that even before imported oil reach our ports, they are already overpriced due to global monopoly control by the oil giants).

Daily overcharges of P7.44 M for Minda extra power

Meanwhile, government’s plan to lease modular generation sets to produce

Power generated by the Agus and other hydroelectric power plants in Mindanao has drastically fallen due to El Nino (photo from http://static.panoramio.com/)

an additional 160 MW of electricity in Mindanao will require millions of liters of petroleum. For purposes of comparison, let us look at the 1 MW Generac Diesel Power Module manufactured by Mitsubishi. This generator, running at 100 percent capacity, consumes 238.56 liters per hour of diesel; at 75 percent, 178.92 liters; and at 50 percent, 119.28 liters.

Using this as yardstick, and factoring in the P8.12 per liter in overpricing, we can estimate how much the people will needlessly spend for additional electricity in Mindanao. We shall use the 100 percent capacity level since the generating plants that will be leased need to run at full capacity to augment the power shortage in the region.

Per hour, the overpricing would be equivalent to P1,937.11. If a 1-MW generator runs for the entire day, the extra cost would be P46,490.57. If the entire 160 MW is generated in a day, the figure would be P7.44 million. For one month (30 days), the overpricing would be P223.15 million. If the 160-MW generators were commissioned for three months (April to June), taxpayers will unjustly shell out around P669.45 million on top of the real price of diesel and the cost of leasing the generating plants.

Unabated oil price hikes and overpricing also worsen the people’s burden due to El Niño in other ways. For instance, farmers who rely on irrigation pumps and fishers who use motorized bancas will have to pay more for gasoline. Note that due to El Niño, more farmers turn to irrigation pumps. Fishers also consume more gasoline as they spend more time fishing (warm temperature drives fish to deeper waters, fishers claim).

Overpriced power, too

Meanwhile, outstanding issues in the power sector continue to unjustly burden the people with or without an El Niño. Due to the ongoing implementation of RA 9136 or the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (Epira) of 2001, power rates remain exorbitant and continue to shoot up. Automatic adjustment in generation charges, for instance, allowed Meralco to again hike its rates for March by P1.38 per kWh. Just last year, Meralco jacked up its distribution rates by 41 centavos per kWh.

The Epira-created Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM) also gave more opportunities for the new private power monopolies to manipulate electricity rates. In February this year, for example, power rates in the WESM spiked to as much as P68 per kWh, which Arroyo’s own economic adviser Albay Gov. Joey Salceda described as “unspeakable”. Apparently, power companies trading in the spot market withheld supply, a market abuse easily done by firms in control of both distribution and generation, jacking up prices in the process. Power sold in the Luzon grid is dispatched through the WESM, a mechanism that will also be set up in the Visayas soon.

These increases become more deplorable as power companies, like the oil firms, also overcharge the consumers. In its December 2009 report, for instance, the Commission on Audit (COA) said that Meralco’s illegal charges could reach more than P7 billion. And Meralco has not even com-

Activists call for the nationalization of the oil industry (photo from www.bayan.ph)

pletely refunded the P34.12 billion in overcharges that it illegally imposed on its almost 5 million customers in the past.

Nationalized energy

The energy sector is a lucrative industry but the billions of profits it makes come at the expense of the people and national development. Such greed and abuse become more deplorable during times of natural calamities such as the current El Niño when the people’s poverty and hunger intensify and the domestic economy is further undermined.

What we need is an oil and power industry that is not privatized and deregulated, and that is not controlled by the Cojuangcos, Aboitizes, Lopezes, Pangilinans and their American, European, and Japanese partners. What we need is an energy sector that is nationalized, state-owned, and effectively controlled by the Filipino people. Only then can we stop overpricing in petroleum and electricity, and better plan the energy needs of our people and economy.