By Estanislao Albano, Jr.
Whenever it gets the heat for the stinking Internet services in the country which would be the worst in Asia if not for the war in Afghanistan, the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) would always point to the circa 1936 Public Service Law which sets the daily fine for erring public service companies at a ridiculous P200.00 as the culprit. Then they predictably would call on Congress to give the agency more teeth by legislating stiff fines so they could effectively deal with the telcos.
The behavior of the NTC reminds me of the Tagalog saying “Kung gusto may paraan, kung ayaw, may dahilan.” Or the English saying which goes this way: “A bad workman blames his tools.”
During the public hearing on the proposal of Senator ?Paolo Benigno Aquino IV for the amendment of Memorandum Order No. 07-07-2011 on February 16, 2017, the question of whether or not the P200.00 fine is per victim or per violation already cropped up. NTC Deputy Commissioner Edgardo Cabarios said that that is an unsettled question but did the commission tackle the issue since then? No. Had the ruling been per victim, then we would now have an effective weapon to go after erring telcos because if the public filed cases against them en masse, the scenario would be altered drastically because the telcos will already be hurt if they do not comply with the regulation.
In the news story “NTC wants 80-year-old law amended so erring telcos can be fined P1M daily” carried by the GMA News online on September 2016, NTC Commissioner Gamaliel Cordoba was quoted as saying that since they cannot make the telcos comply through fines, they play the shame game by publishing in the media those who do not comply with MC No. 07-08-2015 which sets 256 Kpbs as the minimum Internet speed. But since that time, we have not heard the agency come up even with just one press release exposing the failure of the telcos to comply with laws and regulations.
And if they are really using the shame strategy, how come they do not know that for a telco to be fined P200.00 for violating a simple regulation is a public relations disaster that any right thinking public service company would avoid like the plague? That it’s not the amount but the public humiliation?
NTC Memorandum Order No. 07-07-2011 which mandates the telcos to set and reveal their minimum speeds and service reliability would have accorded the NTC countless times to impose the P200.00 on the telcos but — you guessed it — NTC has not yet started to implement the regulation six years after issuance. This is really sad because the regulation was intended correct the opportunistic practice of the telcos to entice the prospective consumers with the maximum speed but keep them in the dark on the guaranteed minimum so that if users complain of weak signal, they will point out that they never made a promise regarding minimum speeds.
Even granting that the telcos are as thick-skinned as carabaos, it is not as though the NTC is left with no options due to the antiquated law. During the above-mentioned hearing, when asked by Aquino if they are limited to the P200.00 per day fine as means of exacting compliance from the telcos, Cabarios answered: “Yes, sir. But of course, we can cancel or suspend. But suspending may also affect the consumers.” That’s like saying murderers should not be jailed because it would affect the situation of their families. And who said that telcos will not also be affected by the suspension of their operations and for this reason, would take kindly to interruption or stoppage of their operations? The telcos run circles around the NTC to the detriment of the public because they know the NTC people have no serious intentions nor balls to enforce the law.
What I am saying is that because of the uncertainty that Congress will soon wake up from its reverie and finally do its duty by the public by updating the 81 year old law, the NTC should make use of the weapons in its arsenal to make the telcos toe the line including its power to suspend and cancel their authority to operate. If its current officials do not have the desire and guts to take the drastic action, then they should be replaced with people who could otherwise the public will continue to be treated like dirt by the greedy and callous telcos. **
