Incessant system collapse, bane of electricity supply —IBEDC

INCESSANT system collapse is one of the major factors responsible for poor electricity supply in the country.

Managing Director of Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company, John Donnachie, who disclosed this said in January alone, the system collapsed four times.

According to him, “This is not about finger pointing but the fact is that the system failure affects our output. Unfortunately most of the customers never get to know about this and blame us for poor electricity supply.”

Donnachie, who was having a chat with journalists, added that one other major challenge the nation’s power sector is battling with is the amount of power lost in transmission, saying 10 per cent of what is generated is lost in transmission.

He said this in effect means that until the trend is corrected, there can never be maximum utilization of electricity generated in the country.

The IBEDC boss, who regretted the inability of the company to fully satisfy the expectations of its customers, said this was largely due to the failure of the government to satisfy its side of the Memorandum of Understanding signed with the Discos.

He explained, “Going by the agreement we entered into with the government, we should be supplied 720 MW weekly but all we get is between 200 and 240MW. Since we can only supply what we receive, it has been difficult to meet the expectations of our customers with respect to electricity supply.”

Donnachie, who reiterated the resolve of his company to do all in its power to make the experience of customers on its franchise delightful, said all hands were on deck to meter as many of the customers as possible, noting however that since meters could not be sourced locally, it would take time to meter all that should be metered.

He also spoke of the ongoing efforts to replace all faulty transformers and upgrade all its facilities across the company’s franchise.

He stated that all the distribution companies had issues with customers’ huge debts.

“Of course we have customers who do not want to pay. In New Bussa for instance, some people are using electricity for free. They have refused to pay and all entreaties to make them pay have failed. In other places, our personnel are often attacked when we disconnect those who are by-passing the meter or those owing. But the serious one is the debt of the Federal Government agencies. MDAs’ indebtedness to IBEDC alone is over N7billion. There is a lot that we can do with N7 billion.”