Barbero ni Juan

Meralco will increase an upward adjustment of P0.1488 per kWh in the overall electricity rate for June, bringing the typical household rate to P14.4833 per kWh.

Driving the overall rate increase is the Wholesale electricity spot market (WESM) prices went up to P7.0281 per kWh due to tight supply conditions in the Luzon grid.

Electricity is generated by major power companies like San Miguel Global Power, Aboitiz Power, First Gen, and Meralco PowerGen.

It is then distributed to households by utilities like Meralco and local electric cooperatives.

The grid was placed on Red Alert for three consecutive days from May 13 to 15, as demand for electricity exceeded 2024’s record level and generation capacity became constrained following a couple of transmission line trippings.

So, basically —

1. Low generation of supply
2. High demand
3. Transmission line trippings

All these incompetencies, the public now has to pay for it.

Meralco’s majority shareholder is Beacon Electric Asset Holdings, Inc., which is 100% owned by Metro Pacific Investments, which is owned by Metro Pacific Holdings, Inc., which is owned by First Pacific Company Limited, which is owned by Indonesian Anthony Salim.

Good job, MVP.

I’m sure Bobi Tiglao knows this too well.

Of course, this entire scheme cannot work in Indonesia at all since it’s the government that has an absolute monopoly of power while independent power producers can only sell directly to the state owned enterprise PLN (Perusahaan Listrik Negara / State Electricity Company).

They’re the only ones that can distribute the electricity that is SUBSIDIZED as enshrined in their Constitution under their commitment to public welfare.

This mandate is rooted in Article 33 of the 1945 Constitution (UUD 1945), which dictates that branches of production important to the state and controlling the livelihood of the public shall be controlled by the state and used for the greatest prosperity of the people.

Imagine, a Constitution that actually works for the people.

Tapi, terima kasih banyak.

Over the past week, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has been pushing banks and e-wallets to make online transfer fees more reasonable under a new memorandum. It said fees must be based on actual processing costs, stay lower than over-the-counter charges, and make sure the receiver gets the full amount sent—no surprise deductions on the other end.

Since then, many have cut or waived fees for InstaPay and PESONet transfers. Here's a full list in case you missed it.

‘IT PAINS ME TO SEE LAWMAKERS ALLEGED TO BE LAWBREAKERS’

Former Ombudsman and Supreme Court Associate Justice Conchita Carpio Morales expressed dismay over charges faced by public officials in recent months during her speech at the University of the Philippines-Diliman 115th Commencement Exercises.

READ MORE: https://inqnews.net/lawmakerstolawbreakers

Bongbong Marcos cannot credibly pass the blame for the flood control scandal to the administration of former President Rodrigo Roa Duterte because of the documentary record.

His own budgets, his own signatures, his own officials' accounts of how the money moved place both the money and the authority squarely in his hands.

The bulk of the flood control spending happened under his watch.

The unprogrammed appropriations that fueled the anomalous projects were released during his administration.

And the instruments that released them, the Special Allotment Release Orders drawn from unprogrammed appropriations, required his own concurrence as President under the General Appropriations Act.

He did not inherit this scandal. He funded it, approved it, and only denounced it after it became politically untenable.

₱129 billion in 2022.

₱254 billion by 2025.

Over ₱545–556 billion total, almost all of it appropriated, released, and spent under his own administration, not Duterte's.

And it's not just the regular budget.

From 2023 to 2024, BBM personally signed off on ₱213.8 billion in unprogrammed appropriations for DPWH "priority" infrastructure, roughly ₱111 billion of which was for flood control.

These aren't Congress quietly moving money.

Every SARO from the unprogrammed fund requires his own concurrence as President.

No Marcos signature, no release.

That's not spin. That's how a legislator explained it on the House floor, to fund nearly 4,000 unprogrammed appropriations-backed projects, the president had to approve them.

The ₱9.7 billion release he greenlit on February 21, 2024, is the clearest exhibit. That was after the House had already inserted ₱60 billion into the 2024 budget, after the anomalies were baked in, and he approved the standby release anyway.

Sequence matters.

He wasn't a bystander who woke up one day to find corruption in his budget. He was the signature at the end of the chain, the one man who could have stopped every peso and didn't, until the public stopped letting him look away.

No Marcos signature, no release. No excuse.