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In Barranquilla and Cartagena, Iván Duque will preside over the welcoming events for the Consorcio Energético de la Costa and Empresas Públicas de Medellín (EPM), the two new operators that will take over, starting this Thursday, October 1, of commercialize and distribute the energy service in seven departments in northern Colombia.
That wide region it was divided into two parts: one called Caribe Sol, made up of Atlántico, Magdalena and La Guajira (totaling more than 1.2 million users), which will be served by the Consorcio Energético de la Costa (Aire); and another called Caribe Mar, made up of Bolívar, Córdoba, Sucre and Cesar (with more than 1.5 million clients), served by the EPM group (Afinia).
The short-circuit between Electricaribe and its users began in 2010, but in 2015, the tacos of this relationship were skipped due to the unusual increase in service interruptions. In 2016, it was intervened by the Government. Added to this was a risk of blackout, constant power failure, damage to electrical appliances due to voltage changes, which even resulted in human injuries and deaths (like that of the father of the actress Milady Dau or that of a woman who was electrocuted when she was with her daughter and her husband, among many other cases); unpayable bills and collective outrage over the fiscal findings of the Comptroller General, El Heraldo recalls.
Because, Electricaribe’s departure is a remarkable fact not only for the Atlantic Coast, but for the country in general, and thus it is patented in the editorials of the main newspapers that this Tuesday, from different perspectives, review the change of operators. And the way they do it is directly proportional to their closeness or proximity to the affected region.
In fact, the Barranquilla newspaper is the most expressive: it qualifies as “Impudence and cynicism” that Electricaribe had failed to comply with “the execution of public resources destined to projects of normalization of electrical networks and subsidies for invoices of users of strata 1 and 2 used to reduce their losses ”.
“A new stage begins for more than 10 million people who suffered for years the intolerable abuses of a company ‘specialized’ in providing a terrible service, which affected their quality of life and negatively impacted the competitiveness of companies and industries on the Coast “, adds the main daily newspaper on the Coast, which also calls the service provided by Electricaribe” disturbing “,” as a result of the inability of the electric company to honor its obligations ”.
For El Heraldo, Electricaribe “goes through the back door, questioned and rejected by millions of users those who were disrespected and mistreated by rendering an unworthy and even inhuman service. It is well gone ”.
El Universal, from Cartagena, maintains that the inhabitants of the region that will be served by the company Afinia (EPM) receive with “enthusiasm” the arrival of the Antioquia group, while ensuring that the last ten years in the provision of the service by Electricaribe “are not to be remembered”, and considers that the region stopped estimating that company “due to the irregular service provided in the cities or the terrible service provided in rural areas.”
Recommend, yes, to EPM to have “Special care” with decisions aimed at increasing rates “beyond what prudence, justice and reality advise, given the battered economic moment the region is going through and the historical weakness due to a poverty that we have not been able to reduce under the institutional mediocrity schemes that we have suffered.
From the interior of the country, the looks are less passionate. El Tiempo, for example, warns that the entry of the new operators “will not automatically translate into the end of Electricaribe’s deep problems, such as high costs, power outages and complaints about the damage of appliances.
“This is a lag of many years of investment and a deterioration that continues to take its toll,” points out this Bogota newspaper. “These it’s high user expectations the two new companies must handle as they manage this difficult legacy”.
But to all these looks is added another that is key. Although it has been recognized that users have been the victims of Electricaribe, El Espectador also focuses on the culture of non-payment, which can be understood as the origin or as a consequence of poor service. That, says this newspaper, “has the two new companies scared” (Aire and Afinia). “At high levels, sometimes the number of people who pay their bill is not even half. There are also reports of piracy in connections and widespread disrespect”.
“It will not be easy or a change overnight. Companies will have to earn the trust of users giving better results as soon as possible “, El Espectador warns, but also underlines that” from the other side, to guarantee the sustainability of the project, people will have to start paying their bills. If we are talking about a new beginning, it must come with changes in the behavior of everyone involved.
And the cherry that this cake is missing is La República, which refers to an evil that not only affects the Coast, but the entire country, and that negatively permeates all spheres of society: politicking. “Hopefully, Electricaribe is the last sad stage of mismanagement sponsored in large part by local and regional authorities, who supported by populist politicians they have not been aware that chapters must be closed and a new stage for the energy service of the Caribbean must begin, in which everyone must do their part ”.
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