RDC joins battle to stop
Visayas power rate hike
BY CARLA GOMEZ

The Western Visayas Regional Development Council yesterday passed a resolution opposing the National Power Corp. power rate hike in the Visayas grid.

The resolution was passed on motion of Negros Occidental Gov. Isidro Zayco at the RDC meeting chaired  by Antique Gov. Salvacion Perez at L ‘Fisher Hotel in Bacolod City.

Perez also called on the rest of the governors of Western Visayas to follow the lead of Zayco and the Negros Occidental Sanggunian by passing similar resolutions opposing the power rate hike.

A court battle now looms with Bamba, wife of Joemarie Garcia, indicating that she will press charges against her brother-in-law, who allegedly shot and killed her husband in Moises Padilla, Negros Occidental, Tuesday, town police chief Inspector Pabiolo Ortiz said yesterday.

Garcia, 36, died Monday after he was allegedly shot by his younger brother, Mark, who is suffering from cancer, at their ancestral home in Brgy. 1 poblacion, Moises Padilla, Negros Occidental.

Mark, 32, immediately surrendered to the Moises Padilla Police Station, but without the firearm he had used, police investigations show.

Sugar leaders and Negros Occidental officials yesterday agreed to create a task force to help mitigate the effects of an expected long “dead season” on the workers of the industry.

A consultation called by Board Member Enrique Miguel Lacson was attended by leaders of the Confederation of Sugar Producers Associations, National Federation of Sugarcane Planters and   the United Sugar Producers Federation of the Philippines, and Board Members Adolfo Mangao, Nehemias de la Cruz and Patrick Lacson at L’Fisher Hotel in Bacolod City.

“We agreed to create a task force and invite other sectors, including labor,” Enrique Lacson said.