03 October 2015, Lagos – The Chief Executive Officer, Egbin Power Plc, Dallas Peavey, on Friday said the continued presence of ‘illegal occupants’ at the company’s housing estate constituted a major challenge to ensuring sustained transformation as well as security of lives and property at the power plant site.
Peavey stated that Egbin had faced a huge setback from the current housing constraints due to the “illegal occupants” who were former employees of the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria.
According to him, Egbin’s current generation capacity of 1,100 megawatts has continued to drive the recent increase in the nation’s power supply.
The company said in a statement that the Egbin Housing Estate, which was commissioned in 1985 as part of the Egbin Power facility, was designed to provide accommodation for employees to promote staff welfare and enhanced productivity.
It said the complex was currently being upgraded by Egbin Power’s new management as major repairs of the schools within the estate had been concluded, with an ongoing overhaul of the recreational centres and housing units.
According to Peavey, the illegitimate residents, their wards and certain groups in the community have been linked with plans to disrupt the operations of the plant and other misdemeanours such as incidences of rape, robberies and vandalism that are already occurring on the facility.
He said, “The illegal occupants are not documented and this is a huge risk in an enclosed environment. Outcomes of various investigations show that some of the criminal and untoward acts perpetrated in the estate have been traced to individuals linked to some of the former PHCN staff, most of whom have either retired or transferred about eight years ago but have refused to vacate the estate after being served quit notices for over two years now.
“They continue to harass our staff and issue threats of major disruptions to the facility. The situation deserves immediate national attention considering the strategic role Egbin plays in the power sector. We therefore appeal to law enforcement agencies to urgently address the situation which may result in sabotage to the plant,” he said.
The Egbin CEO said the housing constraint was taking a toll on the technical personnel and engineers who work on shift and on-call duty.
Peavey said, “Most of the technical personnel and engineers who work on shift and on-call duty have had to seek accommodation outside the company’s facility and now find it difficult to attend to call duties especially when it occurs at odd hours. Employees on shift duty operations that end late in the night encounter several security risks on their way home.
“About 150 of our employees and their families are being denied accommodation as a result of the illegal occupants. We have staff crowded into apartments while the current occupants who have since been paid their severance packages and entitlements refuse to vacate the official quarters.”
He said, “We have about 16 graduate engineers crammed into a three-bedroom apartment, with many more staff and their families being dislodged. Obviously, their prolonged illegal stay is stretching the existing maintenance facilities meant for the legal occupants.
“We are calling for the prompt intervention of the government and law enforcement agencies to address the situation to ensure adequate security of lives and property, and most importantly, sustained transformation in Egbin,” he added.
- Punch
