ABOUT a week ago we wrote about the epidemic that has plagued the natives of “I Am Iloilo City” for several decades with nobody seemingly doing anything about it.
This epidemic of sorts have added to the common parlance words like “brownout”, “blackout” and lately “jumpers” which seem to give the impression that occurrence like these power failures and interruptions are just a day in the life.
It does seem to be the case during the watch of Panay Electric Co. (PECO), erstwhile power provider of “I Am Iloilo City” as it never did anything to address this and the natives were not even aware of the massive scale of illegal electrical connections a.k.a. “jumpers”.
It is this curve that needs to be flattened. These “brownouts” resulting from illegal means are mainly caused by illegal electrical connections overloading the power lines resulting into system overload, causing power interruptions resulting into your classic brownout, or the power lines explode and we have your usual electrical fire that burn down the whole neighborhood.
We’re not just talking about some enterprising individual doing an illegal connection to the power lines and getting his electricity for free. There is something more sinister and on a much bigger scale than some petty power thief.
For decades we have been exploited by unscrupulous individuals who made money at our expense and by PECO that simply plowed back to the consumers the losses entailed by large-scale power thieves and illegal power resellers.
A technical study by engineering firm Miescor Corp. on the city’s electricity distribution network indicated that there were about 30,000 illegal connections when PECO was Iloilo City’s electricity distributor.
“The amount of electricity pilfered from the 30,000 illegal power connections contributed to the huge system losses incurred by PECO that reached 9.3 percent as of 2018, and the cost of this electricity was passed on to the paying regular residential, business and industrial customers,” it said.
It added that because of this, Iloilo City then had one of the highest electricity rates in the country.
When the new power provider took over, its first order of business was rehabilitating the dilapidated and almost obsolete power distribution infrastructure, bringing it up to par of what a 21st century power service provider should be.
Simultaneous with this is a massive campaign against illegal power connections and to date, from these 30,000 “jumpers” more than 11,000 have already been apprehended, 700-plus kilometers of jumper cables seized, and more than 30 individuals charged with violation of the Anti-Pilferage of Electricity Act and Theft of Electric Transmission Lines/Materials Act of 1994 RA 7832which is a criminal offense.
A good number of these individuals were barangay officials. More alarming is that most of these jumper cables seized are of industrial grade, meaning they are not just for individual use but for reselling power. These “power resellers” have been making money by reselling electricity to numerous homes and business establishments and they are quite creative by hiding these cables inside PVC pipes so they would appear to be water connections.
These unscrupulous “jumpers” make money at our expense as legitimate power consumers. We are paying for their electrical consumptions not to mention the systems overload that cause these brownouts.
Lately, there’s a novel approach to gather information to specifically identify and locate these illegal jumpers and resellers – a reward system wherein the informant who gives information upon verification receives a reward of P3,000. Considering the risk and potential danger to the informant, this is all conducted with utmost discretion and the information given is not be used in court nor will the informant be required to appear as witness.
A case in point at the effectiveness of this system was an apprehension just recently of a reseller in Molo district. He supplied power to several commercial establishments and residences just in front of GT Mall in Molo. It seemed this reseller was charging his “subscribers” P15/kilowatt hour and he also provided them with his own meter. Of course, he will be charged with violations of RA 7832.
As a legitimate consumer I am angry at this blatant crime causing undue inconvenience at my expense. I am using my platform as a journalist to spread information that to minimize if not eliminate brownouts, these illegal electrical connections a.k.a. jumpers have to stop./PN
