Communities in Anambra State have given an ultimatum of two weeks to the Enugu Electricity Distribution Company to restore power or face a shutdown of its facility.
The communities were said to have been experiencing inadequate power supply even after they had offset their indebtedness to the EEDC. They said they could no longer endure the epileptic power in the area and thus called on the Electricity Distribution Company to address the menace.
In a press release, the communities cited that it has met the necessary conditions for the debulking of six transformers in the area.
The letter added that “Enumeration and verifications have also been concluded for all the six transformers. Electricity consumers in the Communities have paid for the meters, some installed while some are yet to be installed.”
However, compounding the woes of these communities is the issue of vandalism.
On October 22, some suspected vandals were apprehended by local vigilantes in Nodu area of Okpuno community in Awka South LGA. They were said to have been caught trying to vandalise an electricity transformer in the area.
Nigeria in general has over the years grappled with the menace of inadequate power supply and tackling it was one of the major promises made by the present administration in 2015.
“A responsible government should be able to fix the problem of electricity in six months”…the country’s minister for works, Mr Babatunde Fashola, was quoted as saying during a campaign gathering in 2014.
Ironically, the country led by Mr Muhammadu Buhari has gone ahead to witness the collapse of its national grid seven times in 2022 alone.
However, the country’s leadership does not seem to agree that the national grid had collapsed seven times this year alone under its watch. Goddy Jedy-Agba, the country’s minister of state for power, argued that they were only disruptions and not collapses.
“So, please let us understand that we have not had any collapses this year, we have had disruptions and disruptions could lead to blackouts, a blackout is not a collapse.
“These we have had this year, in fact, four of them, but they have not collapsed, it is disruption. And disruptions have been as a result of the human factors, they could be increment factors, they could be political factors, it could be other factors.”
