Central Negros Electric Cooperative president Vicente Sabornay claimed yesterday that the CENECO board members were aware of the impending power disconnection of the Bacolod City Hall as early as July 2008 yet, since they unanimously passed a resolution concerning the matter them.

Sabornay was reacting to the disclosure of CENECO director Roberto Montelibano that the disconnection of power to the Bacolod City Hall on Dec. 8 was decided only by other members of the CENECO Board and the acting general manager, and not by them.

Montelibano said that he and other board members, Luis Cuenca and Edward Gasambelo, were surprised at the power disconnection of City Hall by CENECO, while they were waiting for the board meeting to start Thursday.

Sabornay said Montelibano came late to the meeting. He said they were supposed to know about it, “but management was not probably able to reach them concerning the action,” he added.

CENECO disconnected power to City Hall and other government offices in the city early Thursday morning citing the city’s failure to pay its accounts with the power firm.

The city, in turn, revoked CENECO’s Mayor’s Permit and padlocked its Administrative Office, also for its failure to pay its franchise taxes and real property taxes to the city.

Sabornay said as a rule, management only acts on the authority granted to it by the board. He said the CENECO board had unanimously passed a board resolution on July 2008, or five months ago, when the CENECO president was Montelibano and the board secretary was Cuenca.

But Montelibano said the two disconnection notices covered by Resolutions 8211 and 8212 passed in July regarding power disconnection to the Bacolod City offices, had already been overridden by a compromise agreement signed by the city and CENECO at the sala of Judge Gorgonio Ybañez on Oct. 31, 2008.

Montelibano said disconnecting power to City Hall entails a contingency plan and since there was none, CENECO operations management was not prepared to respond to emergency calls, resulting in prolonged massive brownouts last Friday.

Sabornay said CENECO was prepared to act on the complaints. However, they could not react efficiently since, he claimed, their operation was “totally paralyzed”. City officials, however, pointed out that CENECO’s operation and maintenance activities were not stopped, only administration.

As to the statements of Montelibano and the two other directors, Sabornay said there may be variance of opinion among them in CENECO but, in the end, it is still the majority that rules.         

Bacolod Vice Mayor Jude Thaddeus Sayson said he believes that the brownout last Friday should not have happened since what the city closed was only the Administrative Office of CENECO.

If CENECO claims that it was not able to respond to the complaints of the people because it was closed, it also has an office in Alijis which was operational, aside from its offices in Silay and Talisay, he pointed out.

Sayson said when he received reports Friday about the brownout in several areas in the city, he called National Transmission Corp. District IV-Negros manager Zosimo Briones and asked if there was load shedding in Bacolod and he was informed that there was none.*CGS

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