Electricity meters: Government warns companies against selling
By Olubunmi Osoteku, Ibadan
The Nigerian Government has warned electricity companies and their representatives not to sell the meters planned to be rolled out for the mass metering initiative, noting that culprits would be made to face the wrath of the law.
This comes as the Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company, IBEDC assured its customers that it was already working on addressing banding issues that the tariff regime brought up.
The stakeholders spoke in Ibadan, on Wednesday, during an FGN/NLC-TUC Ad-hoc Committee Electricity Tarriff parley with customers, consumers and relevant stakeholders of the electricity sector, chaired by the Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Mr Festus Keyamo.
Sounding the note of warning, the Special Adviser to President Muhammadu Buhari on Infrastructure, Mr Ahmed Zakari, said the government, through the regulator’s direct order, had made it clear that with the intervention of the Ministry of Power, the meters are to be provided to Nigerians at no cost.
He said, “Even for meters that would be paid for through the MAP, there is a directive from the regulator to the discos that they need to find a way to reimburse citizens over time. It may not be immediate but over time.”
“If we find any discos or disco representatives selling these meters or exploiting Nigerians to be able to get meters by paying, we will take the full measures of the law against the regulator and we will charge such to the full extent of the law,” Zakari asserted.
According to Zakari, the president had mandated that meters must be free and must come from the local manufacturers so as to create jobs and revive the industry, noting that the government would not take any games from the discos, meter assemblers or manufacturers.
The Chairman of the Committee, Festus Keyamo, said the Committee had been working to achieve an equilibrium figure that would reflect the true price and value for the service of the electricity consumed.
Keyamo stated that the intention of the government was to ensure that consumers were not strangulated by unnecessary exploitative tendencies of discos and that discos were kept afloat, so they would deliver service to the Nigerian people and also attract investors.
He said, “We are not saying service delivery will automatically mean price increase. We are only saying there is an acceptable figure. That figure is the equilibrium and we are looking for that equilibrium that will make everybody happy. And that means that the discos can be kept afloat to deliver services without having to go and look for money to subsidise their operations.”
Keyamo explained that the objective of the Committee is that the ordinary man is not cheated in the sense that the price is not exploitative and the consumer pays the actual price of the service, which is why it is called service reflective tariff.
He assured that at the end of the day whatever consensus reached going forward on electricity would be an agreement between government and labour.
The IBEDC acting Managing Director, Mr John Ayodele, said the issue of banding, which is quite expensive to classify, was being fine-tuned, highlighting some of the teething problems the company had been working on to ensure that banding was achieved.
Some of the electricity consumers at the event identified estimated billings and lack of meters as foremost challenges bedeviling the sector.
In their separate remarks, NLC representative, Comrade Joe Ajero and his TUC counterpart, Dr Chris Okonkwo, said the committee would address issues raised by the consumers and ensure that issues on electricity tariff are resolved without breakdown of peace.
Confidence Okwuchi
