Solons want inquiry on NEA in BENECO row

May 22, 2021 Headlines

The Benguet Electric Cooperative board of director has decided in favor of OIC GM Melchor Licoben and voted 6-4 to his appointment as general manager over Philippine Communications Operations Office assistant secretary Marie Rafael.
This as three congressmen filed House Bill Resolution 1776 Wednesday for the conduct of an inquiry by the House Committee on Energy on the National Electrification Administration’s alleged overreach on the screening, selection and appointments of electric cooperative general managers.
The BENECO BOD on Wednesday decided to reject NEA – BOA Resolution No. 2021-47 which submitted only the name of Rafael for the position.
“The board as collegial body rendered a decision rejecting the RB Resolution No. 2021-47. After rejecting, we reiterate our earlier resolution appointing eng’r Melchor Licoben as Benguet Electric Cooperative general manager,” BENECO president Esteban Somngi said after the board met and decided on who will run the electric cooperative.
The resolution questioned a NEA – Board of Administrator’s resolution endorsing the candidate who garnered the higher score even when
both applicants achieved passing rates for GM of the Benguet Electric Cooperative.
Congressmen Presley C. De Jesus, Sergio C. Dagooc, Godofredo N. Guya, and Adriano E. Ebcas of the Power Bloc of the House of Representatives in filing the resolution said the NEA resolution has given the endorsed candidate unwarranted benefit, advantage or preference over the other candidate, OIC GM Melchor Licoben, who they said is equally qualified to be general manager of BENECO.
“The power granted to the NEA Board of Administrators by law and to its own issuance’s is limited only to a mere screening of the applicants for GMs of ECs and to validate if said officials possess all the qualifications required by law and none of the disqualifications, based on established guidelines,” the three congressmen said in HR 1776.
They added that the “NEA Board of Administrators have absolutely no power to select and appoint the GM or the power to designate a ‘probable appointee’ for the position of General Manager of BENECO.” Atty. Janeene Depay-Colingan has earlier called on the NEA – BOA to rectify the endorsement of only one candidate when both passed.
“Despite the provisions of the law giving independence to the Electric Cooperatives to select and appoint its own general manager, the Board of Administrators of NEA-BOA selected one candidate and approved a resolution endorsing only one of the two qualified candidates for the position of General Manager of BENECO,” said Colingan.
Philippine Rural Electric Cooperatives Association president Presley C. De Jesus said that “the reason the entire 121 electric cooperatives are up in arms is because the Board of Administrators of the National Electrification Administration violated and breached the very clear processes in hiring and appointing general managers that they themselves approved.”
He said the NEA – BOA “should not intervene in the affairs and mandate of the EC’s Board of Directors.” He added that the “BOA committed grave abuse of discretion” by choosing which of the qualified applicants they should endorse” for BENECO’s GM. BENECO employees staged prayer vigil at the EC’s office at South Drive where they aired their support for Licoben.
Licoben got also the support of 120 other ECs nationwide while most of the local government units of Benguet passed a resolution endorsing him to be BENECO’s next GM.
Pigeon Lobien/ABN