Alleged exploitation: Reps want DISCOs to provide meters to consumers

The House of Representatives, on Wednesday directed the Electricity Distribution Companies (DISCOs) to ensure that meters are provided for the electricity consumers in other to avoid exploitation, saying that, about 2.9 million electricity consumers are without meters.

To this end, the House mandated the Committee on Power to interface with the Federal Ministry of Works, Power, and Housing, the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), DISCOs, the Consumer Protection Council, the organised labour, the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) and other stakeholders to address this concern and report back to the House within eight weeks for further legislative action.

The House resolution followed a motion sponsored by Honourable Garba Ibrahim Mohammed entitled, “Need to stop the exploitation of electricity consumers by electricity distribution companies (Discos) through failure to provide them with meters.”

According to him, “The non-provision of meters for electricity consumers by the Electricity Distribution Companies (DISCOs), thereby billing consumers based on unregulated and exorbitant estimates, is one of the greatest challenges facing electricity consumers in Nigeria today.”

He noted that the proposals submitted by the core investors in the DISCOs during the privatisation of the power firms in 2013, about 6.52 million new meters would be installed over the course of five years at the rate of more than one million yearly but the companies have reneged on the agreement.

The lawmaker equally raised concerned that as at March 2016, the 11 DISCOs had collectively provided meters for only 405,255 customers since they took over in 2013, with about three million customers currently without prepaid meters.

Speaking further, he said that only about 151,724 of these meters or 38 per cent were financed directly by the DISCOs and the balance of 251,531 meters or over 60 per cent were financed by the customers through the Credited Advance Payment for Metering Implementation (CAPMI) scheme initiated by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission to close the wide metering gap in the electricity industry.

He also maintained that data submitted by the DISCOs indicated that there are about 6,159,775 customer’s accounts with the Nigerian Electricity Supply Industry (NESI) as at December 2015, with only about 3,206,599 or 52 per cent of electricity users having so far been provided with meters, leaving a gap of 2,953,176 customers without meters.

Said he, “Although many customers have paid for the pre-paid meters, the Electricity Distribution Companies have failed to deliver and install the said meters, a situation that is adversely affecting the investments and businesses of so many customers who have been left at the mercy of the estimated  and exorbitant bills of the Discos.

“Despite the Discos having been threatened with penalisation in the past for breach of the Credited Advance Payment on Metering Initiative (CAPMI) order, and other agreements, they have continued to breach the terms of the privatization a development that is capable of defeating the purpose of the privatisation of the power sector,” he stated.

When the motion was put to vote by the Speaker, Honourable Yakubu Dogara, it was supported by members.