30 November 2016, Sweetcrude, Lagos – The National Assembly plans to sanction the country’s power sector regulator, the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC, unless it moves swiftly to implement existing laws on effective metering and tariff.
Chairman Senate Committee on Power, Steel Development and Metallurgy, Senator H. Abaribe, revealed this at the just- concluded West Africa Power International Convention, WAPIC 2016, in Lagos.
He said there is time limit for power distribution companies or DISCOs to meter electricity consumers according to established regulations in the power sector, noting that there are also penalties for default.
Hinting that NERC might have failed in its responsibility of invoking penalties against defaulting DISCOs, Abaribe declared: “Our job as the legislature is to oversight the particular agency concerned, the regulatory commission. So if the regulatory commission is not doing its job then it is our job to sanction the regulatory commission”.
The Senate Committee chairman added: “I do not see any problem except that we will now have to urge NERC mechanism to actually implement the regulations as they are. Once they are implemented, I’m pretty certain that metering everybody will be”.
Meanwhile, the chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Power, Mr. Daniel Effiong Asukwo, has called on Nigerians to perish the thought of electricity as a free commodity.
Explaining that metre-bypass, power theft and non-payment of electricity bills by consumers have become big problems which should be addressed urgently, Asukwo said: “We have to tell ourselves the truth. Nigerians still see electricity as a free commodity. That is why we keep having power theft and metre-bypasses even non-payment of electricity bills.
“The truth is, if electricity will be free or subsidised, then, the government has to put money into it, but no, government has stopped taking any part since privatisation”.