Anti-Meralco Protests In Cyberspace

Our household’s Meralco bill increased from PhP5,868.60 in March 2010 to PhP8,988.05 for April 2010 or by fifty-three (53%) percent which is no joke by any means. A letter of explanation comes with the bill saying that it is the increase in the generation charge that caused the amount to fly. It further explained that 50 to 60% of the amount billed will not go to Meralco coffer but to their power suppliers like National Power Corporation (NPC), Independent Power Producers (IPP) and Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM). No matter what, the very high increase in our electric bills caused a public uproar against Meralco who, as they claim, is just the collector for the generation companies.

Coming as it is during the lean season for i-café business, the increase in power bill will certainly cause hardship to some. While some i-cafés had lower power consumption due to less customers during the month of April, the amount they have to pay is still higher than the previous month. As electricity consumers, everyone of us has no option but to pay unless you choose to have your connection cut, close your shop temporarily and endure the heat of the season.

The increase in our electricity charges comes at a time when the mainstream press is very busy on the campaign sorties of candidates in the May 10 national election so the public uproar against our very high Meralco bills for April is going unnoticed. Having no way of doing the protest in the street at this time, an online protest is created at Facebook entitled 1,000,000 Against MERALCO and NAPOCOR Electricity Price Hike. All concerned Meralco customers are welcome to join the protest which, as of this writing, has 72,364 members.

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