Season of Anomie in Nigeria’s Power Sector
As for the distribution companies, government must urgently activate relevant sections in the share purchase agreement, to recover our 11 Discos from these investors from hell. They have clearly breached several sections of the share purchase agreement. I
Lamu Audu, the Managing Director of Mainstream Energy Solutions, operators of Jebba and Kainji hydro electricity plants, recently disclosed that power generation companies are now constantly told to cut back on production. This is authoritative and has left me shattered. I am still struggling to recover from the shock. “Gencos can no longer bear the constant energy production reduction orders from the Transmission Company of Nigeria,” declared Audu. It is disheartening to note that at this period when most homes and industries are left without power for days, generation is being deliberately hindered. It has also emerged that electricity distribution companies that have been telling consumers that they are not getting enough supply, have been deliberately rejecting supply from generating companies. This is indeed a season of anomie in the power sector and calls for radical action.
According to Audu, between February 1 and March 13, Jebba and Kainji alone lost 8,574MW unutilised electricity. He added: “The total unutilised energy from all the Gencos within the period under review is monumental and most painful at a time most Nigerian homes and businesses hardly get enough power to meet their consumption needs.”
It is very sad to note that our scruffy Transmission Company of Nigeria can no longer evacuate a meager 4000MW. I have never seen this kind of ineptitude anywhere in the world. TCN’s explanation that “high system frequency, necessitating corrective measures, coupled with the refusal of Discos to take more load” compelled it to direct Gencos to reduce generation is unacceptable. The TCN, as presently constituted, is incapable of helping this country actualise its power vision. There is an urgent need to overhaul the TCN if Nigeria is genuinely interested in getting out of this electricity crisis.
As for the distribution companies, government must urgently activate relevant sections in the share purchase agreement, to recover our 11 Discos from these investors from hell. They have clearly breached several sections of the share purchase agreement. It is terrifying to learn that they have been rejecting power supply from the Gencos, while they go about terrorizing consumers and collecting money for services not rendered. These Discos care less about our nation being enveloped in darkness. They just want to make money from traumatised Nigerians. Discos collect all sorts of illegal money from consumers, yet they pay for only a fraction of the power given to them to distribute. According to a recent report, Discos have been paying for an average of 24% of power given to them by Gencos, while they pocket virtually all the money collected from consumers.
The problem of crazy bills from our silly electricity distribution companies has also assumed an alarming dimension. Unmetered consumers have been going through hell in the last 22 months in the hands of these Discos. Daily, they protest at Discos offices without result. Readings from post-paid metre are consistently ignored by these horrendous electricity distributors. These Discos have been milking unmetered consumers with impunity, largely due to the failure of government and its regulatory agencies. Regrettably, this impunity has assumed a scary dimension under the Buhari administration. Consumers are boiling. Government must take steps to stop the injustice perpetrated by these atrocious Discos. They are simply averse to the metering of consumers because estimated billing provides an opportunity for them to extort money from star-crossed consumers. All previous deadlines to metre all consumers have fallen flat because the political will to enforce the deadline is lacking. For me, this horror can come to an end within six months, if government and its regulatory agencies do the needful. Government must insist on an irrevocable deadline to the Discos to metre all consumers across our nation. Thereafter, all unmetered consumers should enjoy free electricity pending the time they will be metered. If this action is taken, our monstrous Discos will sit up and swiftly metre consumers.
Our lethargic Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC, must also rise from its slumber to save Nigerian consumers. Recall that NERC directed Electricity Distribution Companies to metre customers on their networks, who had advanced money to the Discos through the Credited Advance Payment for Metering Initiatives, before February 28, 2017. NERC vowed to sanction the Discos if they fail to adhere to this new deadline. I doubt if the management of NERC is aware that the deadline had elapsed. It said sanctioning of the defaulting Discos would begin on March 1. This same NERC had earlier directed Discos to conclude metering of these customers before November 30, 2016. Nothing came out of these threats. My dear Anthony Akah, who is the acting NERC chairman, knows that this agency has consistently failed to adhere to its mandate of protecting the rights of electricity consumers. Our languid NERC has, over the years, shown that it is more interested in Discos than consumers.