House of Representatives Ad-hoc Committee investigating expenditure in Nigeria’s power sector has described the performance of electricity Distribution Companies (DISCOs) as a total failure, 13 years after the privatisation of the sector.
Chairman of the committee, Arc. Ibrahim Al-Mustapha Aliyu, made the statement at the resumed hearing with Chief Executive Officers of DISCOs from Abuja, Benin, and Port Harcourt in Abuja.
Arc. Al-Mustapha explained that despite the privatisation of the power sector with the primary objective of delivering stable electricity, Nigerians continue to grapple with poor power supply.
He said the DISCOs have shown little readiness to invest in expanding and upgrading infrastructure to acceptable standards.
According to him, the general perception among Nigerians is that the DISCOs remain the major obstacle to the success of power sector privatisation, noting that after 13 years, there is little evidence of deliberate initiatives to improve electricity supply.
The Committee Chairman emphasized that Government has demonstrated commitment by investing 40% while the DISCOS have 60% but to this end nothing has been remitted to the government treasury as dividend to appreciate the intervention made out of the Taxpayers funds.
Speaking during the probe a member of the Committee Billy Osawaru, described as unfortunately how the DISCOS are subjecting Nigerians to fill the gaps in their failure to provide the needed power in the country as many Nigerians cannot understand whether the DISCOS are privatized or they are still government.
According to him, Nigerians are being forced to buy meter which was supposed to be given free while communities also buy transformers, Poles and other power components in order to get power in their areas which he said were always taken over by the DisCos.
Also in a comment, a member of the Committee, Linus Okorie, accused the DISCOS of neglecting their core responsibilities citing an instance where a community was left in darkness for a long time as a result of vandalisation which the Disco failed to fix.
In their submissions, the DISCOS Executives informed the Committee about their operational challenges which include weak infrastructure, energy theft, meter bypass among others thereby affecting their revenue generation formula.
COV/TSIBIRI
