Electricity distri­bution companies (DIS­COs) in Nigeria finally disconnect historic debtors nationwide

The power sector crisis in Nigeria deepened at the weekend following the mass discon­nection of historic debtors by all the electricity distri­bution companies (DIS­COs) to protest the huge unpaid electricity bills.

Executive Director, Association of Nigeria Electricity Distributors (ANED) Barrister Sunday Oduntan, confirmed this by phone yesterday.

For now, all historic debt­ors, including residential, commercial, Industrial and government establishments across the three tiers of gov­ernment would have to find alternative means of elec­tricity supply until this debt issue is resolved.

As at last calculation, gov­ernment establishments, including the military and security agencies alone owe the DISCOs some 93 bil­lion. The figure comprises 39.1 billion pre-privatisa­tion of electricity assets and 39.5 post-privatisation. Also thrown into the debt calcu­lation is the outstanding in­terest of 15 billion, which the Bulk Trader charges DISCOs for late payment of their electricity bills, a situation that occurred as a result of non-settlement of electricity bills when due.

Two weeks ago, all the DISCOs took pages in na­tional newspapers where all historic debtors were given deadlines within which to pay their debts or have their electricity supply discon­nected.

Sunday Oduntan, Execu­tive Director, Association of Nigeria Electricity Distribu­tors (ANED ) said at the weekend, his member-com­panies had to carry out its threat when it became “obvi­ous that there is nothing on the table.”

He said: “Although we appreciate the efforts of the Vice President Yemi Osin­bajo and the Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, but the stark reality is that there is nothing concrete to hold on to. No allowance for MDAs debt to DISCOs in the bud­get, even though we started discussion before the bud­get was passed. The indebt­edness has become so huge that we are truly troubled about how the government would resolve this without a budgetary allocation. ”

Oduntan. however, made it clear that the current mass disconnection protest embarked upon by DISCOs is not an exercise targeted at MDAs, “but all historic debtors.”

“Our position is that this indebtedness is killing us; it is seriously impacting nega­tively on the entire value chain in the power sector equation. Don’t forget that only 25 per cent of this debt actually belongs to DISCOs, the rest are for other com­panies in the value chain – generating companies, the bulk trader, gas suppliers etc. (Daily Sun)