Published on: Wednesday, July 08, 2009 |
Kota Kinabalu: The Sandakan Chinese Chamber of Commerce (SCCC) has urged the State Government to seriously consider acquiring an 80 per cent stake in Sabah Electricity Sdn Bhd (SESB) from Tenaga Nasional Berhad (TNB) and take over the management of Sabah's power supply.
"It is proven that TNB is incapable of looking after the welfare and interests of the people in Sabah. It is not right for TNB to make billions of ringgit yearly while forgetting about its social duty and commitment," said Secretary General, Stephen Wong Tien Fatt.
He said his statement was based on a Maybank investment analyst that TNB is optimistic that it would achieve RM10 billion profit for the third quarter of this year. TNB made RM4.7 billion in 2007 and RM3.02 billion in 2008.
"The residents of Sabah, particularly Sandakan, have been seriously affected by the threats of constant power cuts for at least a decade. The only body we could turn to is SESB, which claimed to be the problem solver in this matter.
"Yet SESB has repeatedly proved its failure and incompetence in solving the problem of power shortage in Sabah all this while," he said in a statement here Tuesday.
Wong said that three months ago SESB had given its assurance that the load shedding exercise was due to the breakdowns of the power generators in Tenom, Sepanggar Bay and Labuan and that these would be repaired and up and running by June this year.
"It is (already) July and the power supply has not only failed to show any improvements but has worsened with accelerated constant power cuts at an average of at least once per day in Sandakan itself.
"SESB has again given exactly the same reason it gave three months ago," he said.
Wong said Energy, Green Technology and Water Minister Datuk Peter Chin Fah Kui had on May 16 stated that 20 units of 1Mw mobile generators had been provided under an emergency allocation by the Prime Minister to remedy the situation in Sabah.
However, power supply in Sandakan is worsening and the load shedding did no better to aid the residents, he said, adding the schedule for this exercise was also not provided to them.
"All we can expect is a power cut at anytime of the day without warning.
"SESB owes it to the residents of Sabah to solve this problem, which has long existed but it has failed grossly É as such, something has to be done by our State Government to safeguard and ensure the basic right of our Sabahans," he said.
Wong said it was also regrettable that SESB had increased the consumers' deposits because the residents of Sabah could not see the justification for it.
"When it is a fact that theft in power by illegal individuals has also been a factor in contributing to the problem of power shortage in Sabah, SESB instead tries to inflict a collateral attack on the residents of Sabah by increasing the deposit," he said.
At the same time, Wong said SCCC also called on the government to consider replacing TNB Chairman, Tan Sri Leo Moggie and his management team with more suitable people who are driven to find genuine solutions for the problem faced by the people of Sabah.
