Oscarline Onwuemenyi
24 February 2018, Sweetcrude, Abuja – The House of Representatives has mandated its committees on Power, Police Affairs, Interior, National Security and Intelligence and Justice to examine the non-prosecution of electricity equipment vandals in the country.
This followed a motion by Rep. Francis Uduyok on “the Call to Investigate the Lack of Prosecution of vandals of electricity cables and equipment in Nigeria” on Thursday in Abuja.
Moving the motion, Uduyok said there had been reports by electricity companies and the Nigeria Police Force of continuing vandalism of electrical equipment.
He said electricity companies had been attributing power failure all over the federation to vandalism of electrical equipment as a major factor.
According to him, there are reports in the media that the country loses about N500 million annually as a result of vandalism of electrical equipment.
He said, “Section 1 (9) and (10) of the Miscellaneous Offences Act, Cap. M17, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004, prescribes punishment for vandalism of power equipment. But I observe that there has hardly been any reports of prosecution of any vandal in accordance with the provisions of the law.”
Rep. Uduyok expressed concern that vandals had been left for too long to carry out their nefarious activities without any form of sanction being meted out to them.
This, he said, was a development that had encouraged them to become more daring in their sinister plots.
The motion was unanimously adopted when it was put to a voice vote by the Deputy Speaker, Hon. Yussuff Lasun, who presided over the plenary.
The committees were given six weeks to make recommendations on ways to put an end to the nefarious activities of the vandals.
