Given the ongoing extortion being visited on Nigerians by the private electricity distribution companies which took over power distribution in Nigeria from the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria, President Goodluck Jonathan must quickly and personally intervene to save Nigerians from these clearly rapacious characters. The President does not need anyone to tell him that as these companies greedily suck Nigerians pale with their outrageously inflated bills and smile happily to the banks, he (the President) is the one at the receiving end of the people’s odium.
Of course the buck ought to always stop at his table when things go wrong in Nigeria. Moreover, Nigerians are yet to be sufficiently informed about the existence of these new companies so as to be duly reconciled to the fact that they are no longer dealing with a government agency but some private business men who are bent on stretching their ungodly craving for unmerited profit beyond what anyone could comprehend. And despite the unbundling of the power sector and the emergence of several electricity companies with various names, Nigerians still see them as “NEPA”. For them, whatever they are suffering at the hands of the new power distributors are part of the activities of government. No doubt, this is one very ugly development the president cannot afford to treat with kid-gloves, especially, on this eve of the very crucial 2015 elections, in which he would most likely be a leading candidate, and in which the state of electricity supply in the country would certainly be a major campaign issue.
In some way, the people are right. Government is supposed to monitor and duly regulate the activities of these new electricity companies and ensure that they do not oppress Nigerians with over-inflated bills. But the sad situation is that while the National Electricity Regulation Commission remains passive in Abuja, Nigerians are abandoned at the mercy of these greedy companies. Is it that the NERC lacks the capacity to know what goes on at every corner of Nigeria and ensure that Nigerians are not unduly exploited by these companies?
This article was provoked by what happened in Lagos last May (2014) and was repeated in June, specifically in the area formerly known as Sanya Undertaking of the defunct PHCN in Aguda, Surulere. The area is now under the control of the company that goes by the name: Eko Electricity Distribution Company. During the reign of the PHCN, the Sanya Undertaking was famous for the heartless extortion visited on the people residing in that area and the perennial darkness they endured. It got to a stage that residents of a particular street there had to write a petition to the PHCN high command demanding to know why the PHCN staff had turned their street into “a huge lucrative industry.” Now, their relief that the PHCN had gone was only vey brief as the Eko Electricity Distribution Company is making their ordeal at the hands of PHCN staff look like a tea party. The situation is now unbearable!
Although the staff of this company have been flooding the area with huge bills, in the last two months (May and June), they have taken their extortionist tendencies to a most ridiculous extent. What appears very clear is that they just sat in their offices and allocate unspeakably fat bills to the hapless people in that area, thereby causing a lot of outcry from the people.
The arrogance of their staff when the May bills were issued and people left their work and business places and trooped to their offices to complain about the horribly inflated bills in the face of egregiously dismal services was grossly repelling – like adding salt to an injury; extremely offensive. They spoke as if the government has handed Nigerians in that area over to them to treat the way like. Even though many of the people have functional meters, it was clear that they no longer rely on the meters to issue their bills. This writer also went to their office at Sanya to ascertain what was happening, and when he enquired from one of their workers why they should clamp such huge bills upon the people, she just said that there was some “improvement” in electricity supply in May and so the bills must of necessity go up. When she was asked whether they relied on the meters to achieve the figures in those bills, she just ignored the question and looked away. Her indifference was insufferable. Now, the staff of this company are invading people’s homes seeking to determine the number of electrical appliances they possess in order to “assess them properly,” which might mean even higher bills. One of them said they were given a huge amount of money as target to meet every month; so that is why they are terrorizing people.
While still at their office, a woman told me that her landlord has been disconnected from the public power supply and that the man had for a few months now vacated the building, leaving it unoccupied, yet the huge bills have continued to arrive. What it means now is that once someone rents that apartment, they would compel him to offset the bills. It also supports the belief that all they do is just to sit at their offices and impose “levies” on people. I also learnt that a popular photo/graphics studio owner in the area has told them to excuse him with their electricity, that it was cheaper and more effective for him to power his studio with his generator instead of paying their jumbo bills and still using his generator most of the time. Although, I have not confirmed this, I am sure the inflated bills would still be arriving at the man’s studio despite his decision. That is the tragedy of this hour.
In many civilized countries, a president can score a great credit for himself by showing that he could be touched by an outcry such as this and personally intervene in a matter that touches the people even if it is in a very remote area of his country. The Minister of Power, Prof. Chinedu Nebo, cannot afford to be indifferent as this horrible extortion is visited on hapless Nigerians. What happened in this area of Lagos in May has now been grossly repeated in the June bills which are much higher than the bills the people received in May. What it means then is that these outrageous bills have come to stay and would keep increasing every month? And who knows what this electricity company would do to its hapless victims in July and August?
As the people groan under the weight of these inflated bills, they would continue to heap their anger and frustration on the present administration. The President should therefore use this outrageous billing system currently flourishing in the former Sanya Undertaking in Aguda to ascertain what is happening across the country. He should set up a special panel that would report directly to him to come to the area and inspect the bills and meters of the residents and interview some of them to see the kind of unqualified cruelty some people are visiting on others just because they want to be paid heavily for services they hardly rendered.
Now assuming it is true that there were some “improvement” in electricity supply, does that justify the arbitrary allocation of bills to consumers instead of relying on the meter? Is this not a grievous abuse of the business opportunity given to them? No responsible government should abandon its people to greedy business men to treat them as they like.
The solution would have been to create options like what obtains in the telecommunications sector. If one is not satisfied with a particular telecommunication company, one can easily discard the company’s SIM Card and obtain another. But this is not the case in the electricity sector. The country has been shared out to the electricity distribution companies and each company is made to be solely in control of a particular area, thereby, denying the people the power of choice and making it impossible for anyone to migrate from one company to another no matter the amount of terror unleashed upon him by the company controlling his area. Their bitter cry for deliverance must not continue to fall on deaf ears. They may be forced to resort to self-help.
There is also the issue of pre-paid meters which ought to have been issued to Nigerians before handing them over to these distribution companies. Initially, these meters were issued to the people free of charge, but that arrangement was halted. Now, its price has been placed far beyond the reach of the average Nigerian. Something must be done urgently to make pre-paid meters available to Nigerians to enable them pay ONLY for only the amount of electricity they consumed.
By the way, are these companies operating without any form of control? So they are just free to treat Nigerians like conquered victims? The danger in this excessive freedom they are enjoying now is that as the people start becoming aware that they are mere private businessmen intent on over-exploiting them, they may start resisting them. And this may lead to crises whose dimension no one can predict. History has shown that no set of people endure oppression forever; they always seek to secure their freedom from their oppressors in any way or manner they can. Government has a responsibility to halt the excesses of these electricity companies now before they push the people to the wall and we could have violent unrests in our hands. It is better to do something to arrest the problem before it explodes, when the cost of solving it would then become higher. Already tension is brewing in the Sanya Undertaking controlled by this Eko Electricity Distribution Company. I am told that a particular street there has even sent a letter of protest to their Sanya office demanding an immediate end to the inhuman extortion. Many other reactions might follow from other parts of the area. It is, therefore, better and urgent to start any intervention from this particular area immediately before the company’s stubbornness and greed plunges the area to crises.
Finally, it is in the interest of this government to show clearly that it is not on the side of these exploiters against the people. There should be codes of operations for these companies and a provision to revoke licenses for exceeding boundaries. The president must act fast before his political opponents exploit the situation to compound his image problems and hash-tags begin to flood the internet and everywhere else.
Nga, who lives in Lagos, Nigeria, writes from idnga2000@yahoo.com.
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