MANILA - The Manila Electric Company (Meralco) announced Monday that it has restored power to 96 percent of its franchise areas.

As of 8 a.m., only 27 circuits of the 683 circuits in the entire Meralco franchise remain to be without power.

These circuits are mostly located in flooded areas which necessitated the distribution company to interrupt power supply for safety purposes. Count of affected Meralco customers is estimated to be at about 132,000 or around 3 percent of the 4.6 million registered Meralco customers.

"Safety of residents remains to be the primary concern in restoring power to these affected areas. Unfortunately, floods in badly hit areas have been slow in subsiding and this impedes the progress of our restoration work in these areas. We would like to assure our customers, though, that virtually all of our field personnel have already been deployed and have been working round the clock to restore power in the most reasonable time possible," Meralco external communications manager Joe Zaldarriaga said in a statement.

Zaldarriaga also explained that in certain cases, although some households have not experienced any flooding, power leading to them might still have been cut off. This is because the circuits supplying power to them are the same circuits servicing identified flooded areas. As such, until floodwater subsides in these areas, power cannot be restored yet to the circuits servicing them.

"Again, this is to ensure the safety of everyone. In this regard, we are asking for the understanding of the public. In addition, our crews may have to do a thorough inspection of facilities in some households, too, that have experienced flooding earlier. Such may include meters and secondary lines, whose integrity and safe use have to be ensured first before power is restored to affected households," Zaldarriaga said.

Zaldarriaga added that should customers have any difficulty getting through the Meralco hotline 16211, they could also text flood situations in their areas and other Meralco-related concerns over the following numbers: 09175592824 and 09209292824.

In a related development, Meralco provided 26 gensets and 50 floodlights in several evacuation centers in Metro Manila. Meralco said this is in order to assist affected residents in the calamity areas specifically Cainta, Pasig, Marikina, Taytay and other flood damaged cities and municipalities.

Aside from the gensets and floodlights, Meralco also provided thousands of relief bags in the affected areas as it mobilized its employees and personnel to assist the victims of "Typhoon Ondoy".