Outages greet the opening of Mindanao Business Conference
TANDAG CITY (MindaNews / 2 September) — Power interruptions greeted the opening of the 31st Mindanao Business Conference here on Thursday, causing embarrassment to the local business chamber as host.
The outages occurred at least three times during the plenary sessions, forcing organizers to use the standby generators.
Aside from the outages, delegates from the different business groups comprising the local Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PCCI) organizations in Mindanao felt uncomfortable with the humid condition inside the venue—the Stadium of North Eastern Mindanao State University.
“It would have been nice if there was no power interruption. What happened today should be resolved,” said John Vincent Pimentel, president of the host Tandag Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Pimentel said the local chamber officials have met with the general manager of Surigao del Sur Electric Cooperative II to ensure that there would be no power interruptions during the four-day event.
“Few days before, there were no power outages. It was done in good faith considering that preparations were done one month in the making,” he said,
Engr. Frederick Portillo, technical services manager of Surigao del Sur Second Electric Cooperative said a device called cutout tripped, disrupting the power lines to the venue and causing the sudden power outages.
He said this technical gap could not be prevented since the trouble on the cutout device could not be foreseen even if electricity load is sufficient.
Pimentel, however, was grateful that the provincial government and the school administration came to the rescue by providing the standby generators so as not to disrupt the discussions during the plenary sessions.
He also took the mishaps as a sign of the local host business group’s resiliency to face unexpected adversity.
“When we hold such big events, huge aspirations, there is also challenge,” he said.
Pimentel, the event head organizer, admitted that during the preparation he thought of giving up. “But I though I have a big moral responsibility,” he said.
The local chamber took the challenge to accept the offer of PCCI to host the event after two years of hiatus since their counterpart in Surigao del Norte, which was supposed to host it in Siargao Island, declined saying they are still recovering from the damage wrought by typhoon Odette. (Chris V. Panganiban/MindaNews)
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