BEVERLY HILLS, March 15, (THEWILL) – On October 20, 2020, when the Minister of Power, Alhaji Mamman Kwagyang Saleh, announced the plans of the Federal Government to distribute no fewer than 6million free prepaid meters, Nigerians welcomed the idea with apprehension and excitement.
The idea, according to industry players, is designed with a view to ensuring an increase in Nigeria’s metering rate, eliminate estimated billing and strengthen the local meter value chain by increasing local meter manufacturing, assembly and deployment of capacity.
It is part of the Federal Government’s effort to further bridge the country’s metering gap and also cushion the effect of high tariff on the electricity consumers in the country.
This is also a demonstration of the current efforts by the Federal Government to improve power supply and mass metering as part of the agreements recently reached with organised labour.
While many Nigerians believed that the idea would go a long way to improve the supply and distribution and ultimately enhance the efficiency in the consumption of energy in the country, others described it as another misdirected “elephant project” that may not achieve the desired impact on the masses.
Impact on Consumers, Discos
Although, while inaugurating the scheme through the National Mass Metering Programme, which took place simultaneously in Eko, Kano, Kaduna and Ikeja Distribution Companies (DisCos) franchise areas recently, Saleh said the prepaid metering and monitoring system helps compliance and ensures that consumers were not shortchanged and Discos get payment as and when due.
The minister pointed out that in the next 18 to 24 months, over six million metres would be distributed across various households in the country.
“The free distribution of the prepaid meters is to ensure that every household in the country is properly metered and captured in the billing system as this is the way to eradicate the current estimated billing system which has given rise to inefficiency in the sector,” he said.
But the Chairman, Banana Island Residents Association, Chief Femi Coker, in a telephone conversation with our correspondent, said the exercise, if properly managed and devoid of manipulations, would provide succour to consumers and solves their electricity needs.
Coker, however, recalled how residents of the area have been passing through unwarranted stress in the hands of the employees of discos in order to acquire the device.
He said having been subjected to all manners of inhuman treatment, he was not expecting this particular exercise to be less cumbersome and therefore advised that adequate measures should be put in place to ensure consumers do not go through pain to acquire the device.
He said, “Currently, we go through the eye of a needle in order to get the device. This is deliberately caused by the employees of the discos who are using the process to extort consumers and ensure the continuous use of the estimated billing system.
“If the government can be serious about the free distribution of the meters by putting the enabling structures in place, I think collection of the meters would be seamless and devoid of stress.”
Another consumer from Ikorodu, Lagos Mrs Ifeoma Ani, and said “anything free from the government may not be actually free” as what one would pass through may be more expensive than going to buy it with money. Ani said she had applied for the device for over a year now and has yet to be given one.
She lamented the negative attitude of the employees of the distribution companies, which according to her, has been a serious cause for concern towards achieving an adequate metering system for all consumers.
“The Ikeja Electric people have remained adamant to the plight of consumers as regards this, they have refused to meter us but have preferred the estimated billing system as they see it as a pipe to drain the consumers. Now the government has said they are distributing free meters when the people who have paid have yet to receive. How do they intend to harmonise that?
Fear of Manipulation
However, a resident of Surulere, Lagos, Mr Nurudeen Ola, has expressed strong fear that the process, although well intended, may be manipulated and hijacked by what he described as “powers that be” if proper measures were not put in place.
He said people were of the opinion that the 6million meters proposed by the government may end up in the hands of very few individuals who would use the avenue to enrich themselves.
But while reacting, the Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of IE, Mr John Omo, said all necessary arrangements have been put in place to ensure consumers collect the meters without any hitch.
Omo added that at ICE, over 100,000 meters would be rolled out to their consumers in the next few weeks for the first phase of the programme.
He, therefore, appealed to the consumers to support the government to stamp out the menace of energy theft in the industry.
He revealed that key stakeholders to monitor the distribution include government representatives, the community development associations and representatives from corporate bodies as well as representatives of Organised Labour and Civil Society Organisations.
