Bucaramanga aqueduct sanctioned for unauthorized collections in pandemic

The Superintendency of Public Services imposed a $478 million fine against the Bucaramanga Metropolitan Aqueduct for issuing billing with services during the quarantine due to the pandemic in 2020.

There is no proof of impossibility or exception that justifies it in bimonthly periods of March-April and April-May 2020.

This was done, as Blanco Pérez explained, because for 13 days, after mandatory preventive isolation was decreed within the framework of the health emergency by vocid-19, no reading of consumption was taken.

In addition, the Superintendency sanctioned three other public utilities in Colombia, the Society of Aqueduct, Sewerage and Asewage of Barranquilla, Triple A, and the public water utilities of Chaparral and Natagaima, in Tolima.

The Triple A sanction of $653 million was motivated by failing to comply with the obligation to measure the quantities of solid waste to subscribers with permanent capacity of the public toilet service in the municipality of Puerto Colombia, Atlántico, between February and July 2020. This situation affected the right of users to measure and charge for the service in accordance with the actual production of solid waste.

The $59 million penalty for the Chaparral aqueduct provider was imposed for issuing invoicing without complying with some legal requirements established in article 148 of Law 142 of 1994. And, the $30 million fine to the Natagaima Aqueduct Company was ordered when it was found that it billed users on average during the month of April 2020, without proving any impossibility to read the meters.

Sanctioned companies have been guaranteed the right of defence and are within the legal deadline to submit their appeals for reinstatement to the superintendency.

Due to the alleged failure to comply with the judicial decision ordering the completion of the aqueduct and sewerage works in the municipality of Turbaco, Bolívar, the Attorney General's Office summoned the mayor, Guillermo Enrique Torres Cuéter, as well as the former mayor of this town, Antonio Víctor Alcalá Puello (2016 — 2019).

The supervisory body indicated that the Cartagena Provincial Provincial Prosecutor's Office is investigating them because they allegedly did not complete these works essential for the quality of life of the inhabitants of this municipality to northern Colombia, nor did they move a wastewater treatment plant, actions ordered by the 11th Administrative Court of Cartagena in response to popular action.

“It is evident, from the analysis of the evidence attached to the file, that two years and three months passed without warning of compliance with the orders issued by the judge in a popular action decision by the municipality of Turbaco,” states the Public Prosecutor's Office in the decision.

He also indicated that due to an apparent failure to comply with the court order, which was instituted due to the violation of the community's collective rights to public health, healthy environment and environmental sanitation, both the current president and the former mayor of Turbaco were declared in contempt by the Administrative Court of Bolivar.

KEEP READING: