GenSan firms flag job, factory risks from power woes

Businesses in General Santos City warn that worsening power problems could put factories, manufacturing operations, and jobs at risk.

As such, they urged bringing in an outside investor for the financially troubled South Cotabato II Electric Cooperative Inc. (SOCOTECO II).

The General Santos City Chamber of Commerce and Industry said over the weekend that unreliable electricity could eventually disrupt economic activity in General Santos and neighboring Sarangani, particularly as concerns grow over a potential power supply crunch with the onset of El Niño.

“We know that things would be very difficult if it reached a point where service was no longer good, because the jobs themselves in Gensan and Sarangani—the factories, manufacturing, and so on—could be put into a major crisis,” Chamber President Miguel Rene Dominguez said.

The business group is pushing for the resumption of the plebiscite on SOCOTECO II’s proposed joint venture with Primelectric’s IGNITE Power.

The partnership is expected to provide fresh capital and support the rehabilitation and modernization of the cooperative’s distribution system.

Dominguez said the chamber believed it was “extremely important to have a ‘white knight’” for SOCOTECO II, particularly given concerns over its financial condition and power supply problems elsewhere in the country.

MORE Power, a Primelectric subsidiary operating in Iloilo City, serves as IGNITE Power’s benchmark for the proposed joint venture.

The chamber had previously preferred that SOCOTECO II remain a distribution utility if it could improve its governance and secure enough funding to upgrade its facilities.

However, it said “the confluence of internal and external factors” had made it practically difficult for the cooperative to continue operating as a distribution utility.

The proposed partnership can move forward after Regional Trial Court Branch 62 in Polomolok lifted a temporary restraining order that had halted the plebiscite and denied a petition for a preliminary injunction.

The ruling cleared the way for SOCOTECO II’s member-consumer-owners to resume voting on the proposed conditional joint venture agreement.

While backing the deal, the chamber wants safeguards to prevent the cooperative from losing its ownership and influence as additional capital is brought in.

It proposed anti-dilution provisions protecting SOCOTECO II’s board representation and voting rights, including the possible use of nonvoting, nonconvertible preferred shares for future capital infusions.

Primelectric President and CEO Roel Z. Castro said the firm “has heard and is open to the calls of the Gensan Chamber calling for the inclusion of an anti-dilution provision in the corporate structure of the proposed joint venture.”

Castro said IGNITE Power was open to incorporating appropriate safeguards in the joint venture company’s Articles of Incorporation and By-Laws, consistent with applicable laws and regulations.