National Power Corporation v. Arca

Full Text: http://www.lawphil.net/judjuris/juri1968/oct1968/gr_l-23309_1968.html\

Facts: 
On 26 December 1963, the Philippine Power and Development Company and the Dagupan Electric Corporation, filed an injunction suit in the Court of First Instance of Manila (Civil Case No. 55824) to restrain enforcement by the National Power Corporation of a revised rate of charges for the electric power and energy sold by said defendant, which schedule of new rates would take effect 1 January 1964. The Petition alleged, inter alia, that the disputed revised rates, which would increase the cost of electric power and energy being purchased from defendant by plaintiff Philippine Power and Development Company by 24% and that purchased by plaintiff Dagupan Electric Corporation by 30 %, are unreasonable, excessive and unnecessary; that the said revised rates had not been previously approved by the Public Service Commission; and that the unilateral revision by the defendant of the rate and its imposition upon the plaintiffs of the amended contracts embodying said new rates, without first submitting them to arbitration, was in gross violation of the provisions of the current contracts between them. Plaintiff filed a TRO to prevent the scheduled enforcement and was awarded to them. Defendant moved to dissolve the injunction but was dismissed by the court. Hence this petition.

Issue:

Whether or not the lower court has no jurisdiction over the matter and only the PSC was vested the said jurisdiction pursuant to Sections 13 and 14 of RA 2677.

Held:

No. The authority to inquire into the rates of charges for services rendered by NPC does not devolve upon the Public Service Commission. 

Commonwealth Act No. 120, creating the National Power Corporation, specifically provides that the NPC has the power/function/right to sell electric power and fix rate for any service rendered provided that the rates of charges shall not be subject to revision by the Public Service Commission. It is true that under Sections 13 and 14 of Republic Act 2677, amending the Public Service Act and approved on 18 June 1960, the Public Service Commission was vested with jurisdiction to fix the rate of charges by public utilities owned or operated by any instrumentality of the National Government or by any government-owned or controlled corporation. But the enactment of this later legislation, which is a general law, cannot be construed to have repealed or withdrawn the exempting proviso of Section 2, paragraph (g), of the earlier Commonwealth Act No. 120 above quoted. For it is now the settled rule in this jurisdiction that a special statute, providing for a particular case or class of cases, is not repealed by a subsequent statute, general in its terms, provisions and applications, unless the intent to repeal or alter is manifest, although the terms of the general law are broad enough to include the cases embraced in the special law. 

In the present case, there appears no such legislative intent to repeal or abrogate the provisions of the earlier special law. From the explanatory note to House Bill No. 4030, that later became Republic Act No. 2677, it was explicit that the jurisdiction conferred upon the Public Service Commission over the public utilities operated by government-owned or controlled corporations is to be confined to the fixing of rates of such public services, "in order to avoid cutthroat or ruinous and unfair competition detrimental to operators and to the public interests. No other conclusion appears possible, therefore, than that the authority of the Public Service Commission under Republic Act 2677, over the fixing of rates of charges of public utilities owned or operated by government-owned or controlled corporations, can only be exercised where the charter of the government corporation concerned does not contain any provision to the contrary.