A Civil Society Organisation (CSO) , Association for Public Policy Analysis (APPA), has called on the federal government to put measures in place to protect the rights of electricity consumers.
The National President of APPA, Mr. Princewill Okorie, who disclosed this in an interview on Tuesday in Abuja, reacted to the recent plan by Fidelity Bank to take over the boards of Kano, Benin, and Kaduna Distribution Companies (DISCOs) and to collateralise their shares.
Recall that that the Director-General, Bureau of Public Enterprise (BPE), Mr. Alex Okoh, and the Executive Chairman, Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), Mr. Sanusi Garba, testified to this in a joint statement issued in Abuja recently.
“Today, we were informed by Fidelity Bank that they have activated the call on the collateralised shares of Kano, Benin and Kaduna (Fidelity and AFREXIM) DISCOs.They have also initiated action to take over the Boards of these DISCOs and exercise the rights on the shares,” the statement read in parts.
But, Okorie said there was the need for the Federal Government to set up a committee to monitor consumer interest following the development.
“What had been existing all this while is that section 80 and 81 of the Electricity Power Sector Reform Act has been silent. We found out that implementation of section 80 and 81 of the Electricity Power Sector Reform Act that deal with electricity consumer protection and licensee performance standards are not well enforced.
“You see a situation where consumers pay for electricity not supplied and their rights abused. If the bank wants to recover their money, the consumers also wish to recover the money that they have been cheated for,” he said.
Okorie called on the Consumer Protection Council and the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) to ensure everything was done to protect electricity consumers.
He also appealed to power stakeholders to ensure stable power supply to reduce cost of production of goods and services.
According to him, most of the businesses in the country depends on generators and this has made production cost to be high.
” I am appealing to all stakeholders in the power sector to do everything possible to ensure stable power supply to reduce the cost of production of goods and services, ”he said.
