IGBOZURUOKE MEDIA

That electricity supply profile has plummeted; and the nation thrown back to an era of power outages, rationing, low current and general epilepsy reminiscent of the period when the power sector was managed wholly by the government, are now common knowledge. It is now back to the status quo ante experienced during the days of the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA); and later the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN). Nigerian electricity consumers are still paying heavily for electricity not supplied.

The scant improvement witnessed during the first few months of the coming of the President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration appears to be a mere deception. Power supply flops; increases in electricity tariff that take no cognizance of electricity supply failures by power distribution companies DISCOs; as well as the latter’s woeful failure to provide prepaid meters to electricity consumers, still persist. The National Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), with the obvious backing of the Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola, recently jerked up electricity tariff by 45 percent, beginning from February 1 this year. Fashola says the new tariff is a painful pill Nigerians must swallow in the interest of the country, though he acknowledges the fact that the right thing to do is to increase power supply before hiking tariff. Nigerians must now suffer for the ineptitude of the government, while the public officers that devoured the power sector stroll away with no punishment.

This is unacceptable in a country that plunged about N2.7 trillion into the power sector in 16 years (1999 to 2015). Reports some days ago said the nation’s unreliable electricity generation capacity dropped to 2,000mw from the 4,300mw peak recorded lately as a result of partial system collapse at the Shiroro Generation Company. The development forced down the electricity allocation of many DISCOs and worsened power supply nationwide. This has consistently been the trend since November 2013, when the former government of President Goodluck Jonathan handed over the power sector to private electricity generation companies (GENCOs) and DISCOs. Recall that NERC gave approval for each consumer having prepaid meter to cough up N750 monthly as fixed charge; and another N500 as meter maintenance fee. Consumers without prepaid or even the old meters are crippled with outrageous charges dubbed as coded or estimated bills on monthly basis. All the bills are extorted from the public whether or not electricity is supplied. Besides, millions of customers that deposited monies for prepaid meters are yet to be supplied the gadget. Many believe the DISCOs are most unwilling to make prepaid meters available because they fear that doing so would free consumers from their reckless charges for electricity not supplied.

The Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC), while protesting the latest tariff increase, said it had become evident that the unbundling of the PHCN was a well-crafted ploy to deceive Nigerians into believing that it would address electricity supply pains. Indeed, critics say the unbundling was make-believe and slipshod, considering the acute gas shortages to power the generation companies, a weak transmission network, as well as the financial and technical incapacitation of the new private owners that trailed it.

The Federal Government has undertaken to underwrite the debt of N220 billion the power sector owed gas firms to guarantee uninterrupted gas supply to GENCOs; and voted another $1 billion for the upgrade of the power transmission network, which Manitoba International, a foreign firm, is in charge of. However, there are also other knotty issues not sorted out as yet. Fashola, according to reports last Tuesday, was at the 3rd monthly sectoral meeting of operators in the electricity industry held at the Ugwuaji Transmission Station, Enugu, in Enugu State. The minister said the meeting addressed the problems of gas, financial stability, volatility of foreign exchange and how its effects the power sector, as well as the problem of pricing local gas consumption in dollars instead of naira.

But of more relevance to electricity consumers, perhaps, was the minister’s insistence that DISCOs “must take responsibility for providing meters, because that is what is in the new tariffs that they have”. He said a situation where DISCOs collected money for meters from consumers without supplying the facility undermined trust. Nonetheless, Nigerian electricity consumers expect no less than an iron cast intervention by the FG to end the rip-off of consumers by DISCOs through the non-provision of meters. This seems the only option that will wake up the DISCOs that have been snoring away all along from their slumber. They have fed fat enough from electricity not supplied. The Buhari administration should realize Nigerians are bitter because of the rot that is still dogging the electricity sector.