MERALCO's crazy power surge

While checking out my twitter, one of whom I follow posted a link to Chuvaness' blog. The post is about her MERALCO bill last March that went unbelievably high, doubled her Feb's bill. PHP 41,902.95 beat that!!!! What makes me even wonder is the rapid increase in KWH rate from PHP 5.02 in March 2009 to PHP 6.67 in March 2010. That's a whooping 32.8% increase! OH. MY. GOD. PHILIPPINES.
I didn't know electricity in this country is quite a luxury. Why is it so expensive? PHP 6.67 rate per KWH is quite big. An average household normally consumes 1000, multiply that by 6.67 gives you PHP 6,670 excluding charges and other add-ons that believe me, is as high as Mount Everest itself. That's big money already. And that's if you exert an effort to minimize monthly power consumption by taking measures such as unplugging unused appliance, switching off lights when not used, using power saving bulbs, flatscreen monitor instead of CRT (yeah it helps), electric fan instead of aircon, defrost fridge at night, using gas stoves, clothes hand washed and hung to dry and so on and so forth...
I don't live in Manila that's why I'm not aware of this whole MERALCO crazy power rate. Back home, in Mindanao, my mother would go nuts when our electric bill looms around PHP 1000.00 and that didn't even come close to Chuvaness' amazing 41K bill! I'm not sure how much we pay for every KWH consumption, surely it's not PHP 6.67 though. I don't go into details and our electric bill hasn't gone insane as far as I could remember.
However, it doesn't mean I'm not livid with this kind of oppression. This is clearly another "electrifying" cruelty among our people by the tyrant, almighty government. A lot of people think MERALCO (Manila Electric Company) is solely owned by the Lopez Family, but check this out : The government actually holds the biggest share, 24%, and holds three (3) of the eleven (11) board seats. And they did this to us? What happened to "government is for the people, by the people and of the people"? Damn this administration! Damn you Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo!
Now I understand why many investors fled out of the country. Why we don't go forward, why we are poor, why we are always behind. Our nation is corrupt. Our government officials don't feel any sort of sympathy to the people. I hope someone out there will make a stand to stop this deliberate oppression and abuse of power. I hope whoever will be the next president will remain truthful to his word in advocating interest and welfare of the Filipino people.