The long rotational brownouts are being blamed for a rise in crime in
Davao City – by as much as 20 percent – with police noting the rising
trend since the outages started, a Mindanao news site reported late
Thursday.
Davao City police head Senior Superintendent Vicente
Danao Jr. said the 20-percent rise negated a 35-percent drop in crime
from the fourth quarter of 2013 to the first quarter of 2014.
“Stay
home. If you really don’t have somewhere to go during the brownouts,
don’t leave your homes because that’s when the criminals are taking
advantage of the cover of darkness,” he advised residents, according to a
report on MindaNews.
He also asked the Davao Light and Power Company (DLPC) to immediately address the power situation.
The
DLPC had said Wednesday its power allocation was reduced by 18
megawatts, dropping power supply from 120MW last week to 102MW starting
Wednesday.
Because of this, DLPC was forced to extend daily brownouts from six hours to seven-and-a-half hours.
Citing police data, Danao said most of the incidents committed since the brownouts started were crimes against persons and against property.
Police were also affected by the brownouts as "(w)e can’t see in the dark,” he added.
Even closed-circuit television cameras would be of little use as they may not be able to capture images in in the dark.
Anti-terror efforts
MindaNews also said Task Force Davao, a batallion tasked to combat terrorism in the city, is helping maintain peace and order.
Task Force Davao head Casiano Monilla said TFD has deployed seven four-member, two-motorcycle teams to help monitor the area, especially during brownouts.
Task Force Davao head Casiano Monilla said TFD has deployed seven four-member, two-motorcycle teams to help monitor the area, especially during brownouts.
Business
Meanwhile, a separate report on Davao Today said the brownouts have worsened effects on local businesses.
The report said traders had to buy more ice to preserve meat in abattoirs and pay workers of full salary for undertime work.
“Aside from the power failure, increased cost of labor and low productivity, the power cost is very high because the distributors have to buy from suppliers who are running their diesel-fired power generators,” local business leader Bonifacio Tan told Davao Today on Thursday.
Local traders have been mulling retrenchment of workers and cutting down on production to cope with lost working hours.
For its part, the City Council committee on energy (COE) has promoted alternative energy sources such as portable solar panels. — By: Joel Locsin /LBG, GMA News
The report said traders had to buy more ice to preserve meat in abattoirs and pay workers of full salary for undertime work.
“Aside from the power failure, increased cost of labor and low productivity, the power cost is very high because the distributors have to buy from suppliers who are running their diesel-fired power generators,” local business leader Bonifacio Tan told Davao Today on Thursday.
Local traders have been mulling retrenchment of workers and cutting down on production to cope with lost working hours.
For its part, the City Council committee on energy (COE) has promoted alternative energy sources such as portable solar panels. — By: Joel Locsin /LBG, GMA News
