THE Supreme Court has upheld the constitutionality of several provisions of the Republic Act No. 9136, or the Electric Power Industry Reform Act allowing the Energy Regulatory Commission to fix and approve the universal charge imposed on electricity end-users and allow power distribution utilities to recover their losses.
The Court’s ruling denied the petition filed by various partylist groups led by Fernando Hicap of Anakpawis Partylist and representatives of various social advocacy groups against the ERC and Manila Electric Company , a power distribution company led by businessman Manuel V. Pangilinan. As the generation charge would impact other bill components such as system loss charge, value-added tax, and the local franchise tax, Meralco said the resulting increase to an average residential customer amounted to P4.15 per kWh.
The SC, however, issued a temporary restraining order on December 23, 2013 in connection with the petition earlier filed by Bayan Muna, enjoining the collection of the increased charges from customers. The petitioners maintained that the generation and supply sectors of the electric power industry are not public utilities and thus, not subject to ERC’s regulation.