By Estanislao Albano, Jr.
Note: This is a letter to the editor published by the Manila Times on its July 22, 2016 issue. Let’s see now what the anti-public people of the National
Telecommunications Commission will say.
Based on the experience of Tabuk City internet users, the NTC is not only a good-for-nothing agency but appears to be on the side of the telcos because why else would it drag its foot on the case of poor and long suffering internet users like us?
In November last year, 47 local internet users finally ran out of patience and wrote the NTC asking for an investigation of the systems of Smart Communications and Globe Telecom for overloading, stating that their speed was such that one could go take a bath before a command is effected, and that there are times when the signal is so weak it does not allow any activity at all.
They also alleged being discriminated against because the signal of the telco in Tuguegarao City and other areas is several times stronger. At that time, the daytime speed of the two telcos did not exceed 100 kbps while in Baguio City it was more than 1 mbp and, in Tuguegarao City, more than 600 kbps.
Through Resolution No. 168-A, passed on Dec. 1, 2015, the Sangguniang Panlungsod backed the call for an investigation.
When I called Deputy Commissioner Edgardo Cabarios sometime in early February, he told me his office and that of NTC-Cordillera would shortly conduct an investigation. However, up to now, the investigation has not yet taken place. And that’s even after I visited, last April, the NTC national office and talked to Engr. Imelda Walcien, acting director of the Regulation Branch of the NTC. She claimed that they had immediately acted on the complaint by calling the attention of the two telcos, with Smart saying that the problem is it cannot find technicians to fix the damage wrought by recent typhoons on their infrastructure.
As to why there was no investigation, Ms. Walcien claimed that Smart had reported to them that NTC Region 2 had already conducted one, which was a fat lie because when I later called NTC Region 2 Hearing Officer Jumar Cabulisan, he said they were not aware of the petition of the 47 Tabuk City internet users.
As to why the complaint of the disgruntled users was not even acknowledged, Ms. Walcien said at first that there was no return address in the complaint. But when I pointed out that there was a return address on the envelope and some of the complainants had their cell phone numbers in the complaint, she eventually said they were waiting for the report of the two telcos on what action they had taken on the complaint before they would communicate with the complainants. She said that was the same reason they had yet to acknowledge the resolution of the Sangguniang Panlungsod.
Whatever. Up to now, more than six months after it received the complaint of the internet users and the resolution from the Sangguniang Panlungsod, the NTC still has to inform the two parties what it has done about the issue, if any. This is not only deliberate neglect of its duty to protect the interest of telecommunication users but gross violation of the injunction [by President Duterte] to government officials and employees to respond to complaints immediately.
Let me add that the only time any NTC personnel set foot in Tabuk City was sometime last year when an NTC Cordillera personnel came to test the internet signal in the barangays of the city as part of the agency’s fixed broadband monitoring for the entire country. Alas, when I formally asked them for the readings, they emailed me the entire result of their validation, which reflected no readings for Tabuk City. Could this agency do even the simplest jobs like measuring the strength of signals?
I sure am talking for the complainants and other Smart clients in Tabuk City, I now request President Rodrigo Duterte to overhaul the toothless, inutile, lying and treasonous agency. (Since February, Globe has been offering services from 2 mbps to 10 mbps.)**
