The increase in the spate of pipeline vandalism,
particularly of gas pipelines in Nigeria’s oil-rich Niger Delta, has compounded
the nation’s power supply situation. Generation capacity recently dropped to a new
low of about 600 megawatts, MW, thus throwing many areas into darkness, as
residents national complain of barely receiving up to three hours electricity
supply daily Residents in some localities visited by Vanguard including;
Satellite Town, Ijegun, Waterside at Oriade, Tipper Garage, Okokomaiko, Ojo,
Ebuta Metta, Idimu, Surulere, Festac, Akoka, Palm groove, Oke arin at Lagos
Island, Orile, Amukoko, Ajegunle, Oko-Afo, and Ile-Ipo, both along the Badagry
Road, all complained of worsening electricity supply situation.
Supply situation
At Satellite Town, a resident, Mrs Joy Okoye, (a business
woman), complained that the deterioration in power supply has almost rendered
her bankrupt, as a larger portion of her income continues to go into fuelling
her generators at very high costs. According to her, “We cannot boast of power
supply for two hours in three days or even four days. Some of our businesses
live on the lifeline or you are sent out of business if you cannot match up
with the realities on ground; not to mention the increase in the prices of
commodities due to the hike in fuel price.
“For some of us, who live in flooded
areas, mosquitoes and other pests are very evident and as such the need to
power your generating set is of utmost importance if you don’t want to spend
more money on medicine and treatment as a result of attacks by these insects.
“We hope the rate of death or suicide will not multiply because many hopes are
dashed. If the country’s power supply is effective, businesses will grow.” A
house owner at Orile, Mr. Baba Omotosho, lamented,
“For us, there is nothing
like power supply. If we see it, we take it, but if we don’t, we don’t act
surprised. “It would not be new to us, if, instead of celebrating five months
of constant power supply in the country, we mourn five months of no power
supply at all. “This is not to mention the bills we are subjected to pay on a
monthly basis of power blackout. The government should as a priority address
this power crisis and put things in order for its citizens.”
On his part, a
trader, on the Island, Chief Ebube Odinaka, questioned Federal Government’s
sincerity to tackle the unending crisis in the power sector. “The issue of bad
power supply is not new to us, however, what is still new is the effort beyond
‘political pronouncement’ from the government to help address what I call
‘Nigeria epidemic’ as far as power is concerned.”
DISCOs blame vandals
However, the Distribution companies, DISCOs, blame the
situation on the resurgence of attacks by pipelines vandals. As consumers
continue to wallow in darkness, the DISCOs are also challenged in load-shedding
the limited power allocated to them by the Transmission Company of Nigeria,
TCN, while calling for more patience and understanding. Spokesman for Ikeja
Electric, Mr. Felix Ofulue, explained that the attack on the Chevron Platform
in Warri, has led to a major drop in its load allocation from the National
Grid. His words: “Due to attack on the Chevron Valve Platform in Warri by the Niger Delta Avengers, NDA, current gas supply to generating companies have been adversely affected, and this led to a major drop in our load allocation from the National grid. “Few months ago, the same militant group had claimed responsibility for the bombing of the Forcados 48-inch export terminal, which also resulted in a dramatic drop in our average load allocation from 500MW to 250MW, a sharp decline to the average daily supply of 1250MW required to effectively serve our network of customers.
“Consequently, with this recent attack, the supply is likely to drop further, leading to extended periods of outages across our network and other parts of the country, while we assure all our esteemed customers of equitable distribution of supply across our network.” He also appealed to customers, “to report cases of meter bypass and illegal connections of cables, as these fraudulent activities will sabotage the process of fairly distributing the limited supply to legitimate customers who pay their bills.” He added that, these illegal energy consumers are the primary cause of high estimated bills and also are responsible for unaccounted energy losses.
Source:Vanguard
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