- We’re Still Providing Meters to Customers
Ikeja Electric has said it is still pushing ahead with its metering scheme to ensure the provision of prepaid meters to all its customers.
The company said it was concluding the enumeration of its customers and technical audit of assets in its network.
The Head, Corporate, Communications, Ikeja Electric, Mr. Felix Ofulue, stated this after an inspection of the metering project on Lasisi-Oshoja and Ore-Ofe streets in Idimu, Lagos, on Tuesday.
He said, “We are taking stock of the customers so that they can benefit from our metering scheme. We are also taking stock of our assets to know how many of them we need to rehabilitate and what we need to replace. We started this a long time ago and we are just trying to round it off now.
“There is so much noise that we are not metering but we are still providing prepaid meters to customers. It may not be at the pace the customers want, but we are metering. Right now, we are metering Idimu and Ikeja GRA. We are still doing the customer enumeration and technical audit at Amuwo Odofin before commencing the metering.”
Ofulue said the company had engaged a couple of meter manufacturers, adding, “We are currently in talks with them.”
One of the residents of Lasisi-Oshoja Street, Mr. John Familugba, reportedly said, “We were just provided a prepaid meter and it is a good development. It will put an end to estimated billing. Now, we know that whatever we are paying for is what we are consuming. Nobody will come to my house to disconnect my line. The fact that the meter is on the pole shows that it cannot be tampered with.”
Another customer, Chief Olusegun Ajayi, was quoted as saying the deployment of the prepaid meters would minimise the problems between the power firm and the people in the community, and encourage energy efficiency.
“It is a welcome idea because if you don’t pay, you can’t have electricity supply. It will also make consumers to stop abusing electricity. If you think you can abuse it, you will be spending a lot of money.”
Based on the proposals submitted by the core investors in the Discos during the privatisation of the power firms in November 2013, a total of 6.52 million new meters were expected to be installed over the course of five years.
But three and a half years after the privatisation, many of the Discos have been unable to meet their metering obligations under the Performance Agreements with the Bureau of Public Enterprise.
According to the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, only 3.39 million customers have electricity meters as of December 2016 out of 7.47 million customers in the country.
The Discos promised to install 1.754 million meters last year but only 215,424 meters were made available to their customers, while over 50 per cent of customers remain unmetered.
