BPE commends IBEDC for embedded electricity generation

Acting Director General of the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE), Dr Vincent Akpotaire, has commended the Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company (IBEDC) for its efforts at improving power supply to electricity consumers under its network.

The BPE boss gave the commendation while speaking to newsmen after a routine inspection of the facilities and activities of the company in Ibadan.

According to Dr Akpotaire, the essence of the visit was to find out how far IBEDC has gone in meeting its obligations to consumers.

“At the point when they came in, they signed up to certain Key Performance Indicators and obligated to improve on their distribution efficiency and basically improve on power supply. So, it is imperative that as the contract managers, the Bureau of Public Enterprises must try at all times to ensure that the investors hold themselves bound by what they are obligated to do. So, we are here to actually monitor compliance with the agreement reached with the Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company investors,” he said.

He also gave kudos to the management of IBEDC for the investments it has made in its distribution network, especially in the area of embedded generation, which is geared towards improving the quantum of power available to consumers.

He, however, noted that there are still substantial gaps in compliance in the area of ensuring that all electricity consumers get prepaid meters, stressing that there is room for improvement.

“They (DISCOS) have different explanations for not meeting up with the metering plan, ranging from the issue of tariff; whether the tariff allows them to aggressively meter.”

The BPE boss charged IBEDC to continue to work towards reducing its technical, commercial and collection losses and advised the company not to allow the restriction imposed by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) on its capital expenditure to slow down its ability to provide meters to consumers, saying, “If you don’t improve your metering, you cannot improve your collection.

If you improve your metering, you will improve your collection. But if you wait for collection to improve as a basis for metering, then you are getting it wrong.”