By Michael Nnebife
The present dwindling and epileptic power supply in South East may not end soon, as the cost of essential commodities and economic hardship in the country continue to increase.
The Head, Corporate Communications, Enugu Electricity Distribution Company, EEDC, Mr Emeka Eze, gave the indication while speaking in a programme in Awka, Anambra State, recently.
Mr Eze, who spoke on the challenges currently facing EEDC, among others, also identified the reasons Nigeria could not have 24 hours power supply as obtained in neighbouring countries which depend on it for electricity.
He said that in the month of January, the power generation company had a challenge of gas supply due to debt owed to the gas suppliers.
He stated that as a result of this, the rate of power used to be generated by the generation company reduced. This development, Eze said, affected everybody, including EEDC.
‘The problem is that the 9% allocation given to us was reduced because generation was reduced.
‘This also affects the customers; for instance, a customer, who used to get eight hours (of power supply), may be getting three or four hours now,’ Eze said.
He appealed to the customers to bear with EEDC, saying the company could give only what it received to the customers.
Eze attributed the cause of the problem of gas supply to the inability of EEDC to recover its revenue from the customers.
He said, ‘We that interface with customers are given power to distribute. After the distribution, getting the money for the power distributed becomes a problem.
‘Every month goes with a loss of about 40% of our revenue. We struggle to recover 50% of our revenue.
‘So, how will the person that generated the power get his money returned to pay the gas suppliers?
‘So everybody has a contribution to the current power problem,’ Eze said.
He lamented that the situation was not palatable to EEDC as people assumed, saying that at the end of the month, they always worried about how they were going to pay salaries because the money for the power they were given and distributed was not gotten.
He emphasized the need for reorientation of the people to have the understanding that electricity had been privatized; therefore necessitating that every electricity generated, supplied, and used, should be paid for.
He pointed out that the countries which received 24 hours and uninterrupted power supply from Nigeria paid for it.
‘Their population is not up to that of Nigeria. Our energy demand in Nigeria has risen, and power generated is not enough,’ Eze continued.
He however expressed optimism that the current challenge in the power sector would soon be a thing of the past as he explained that the Minister of Power had waded into the situation.
Eze, who further recalled that 90% of the power business in Nigeria depended on foreign exchange, pleaded for urgent attention to foreign exchange rate in the country, as, according to him, it concerned power, so as to make investment in the sector attractive.
