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By Marian Jean F. Benetua And
Cris-Ann G. Odronia
, Special to The Manila Times
BANTAYAN ISLAND, Cebu: The
government should not be in business.
This was the reason cited by the
head of the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) in apparently
refuting reports that the pension fund wants to wrest control of
Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) from the Lopezes.
“We are not intending to take
over Meralco. We are only after change of management so that
fairness can be done to the shareholders and fairness can be given
to the consuming public,” Winston Garcia, GSIS president and
general manager, said on Friday.
When asked if the decision not to
continue with the government pension fund’s reported attempt to
grab Meralco from the Lopezes was given a “blessing” by
President Gloria Arroyo, Garcia replied that it was not.
“It has no blessing from Malacañang.
I have always been independent in my actions in GSIS,” he said.
Garcia has been president of the pension fund for seven years.
He said President Arroyo has
never intervened in the affairs of government institutions,
especially GSIS.
The government pension fund is a
stockholder of Lopez-owned utility and holds four seats in the
11-member board of the country’s largest electricity distributor.
The rift between GSIS and Meralco centered on accusations of
mismanagement and lack of transparency in the utility.
Garcia said that all he wants is
for Meralco to be run professionally. According to him, he had even
recommended to the Lopezes that they form a management team that
will effect necessary changes in the utility.
Patriarch Oscar Lopez on Thursday
said GSIS can buy out Meralco.
“The Lopez group can attest to
the fact that I suggested to them to give us names that can
implement necessary reforms in Meralco, so we can give fairness to
the shareholders and, most of all, we can immediately lower the cost
of the electricity [distributed by] Meralco,” the GSIS chief said.
“We cannot have a situation
wherein [Meralco’s electricity] is the most expensive in Southeast
Asia and the most expensive electricity in the Philippines,”
Garcia added.
That situation, he said, has to
stop. Garcia said Meralco alone, not the National Power Corp. (Napocor)
is to blame for the high cost of electricity in the country. Napocor
is a source of the electricity that the utility distributes.
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