Mummy!
Off the candle. No My Dear its Electricity Supplied by National Electric
Power Authority NEPA By Prince
Charles Dickson Jos,
Plateau Nigeria It’s
easier to wake a man that is sleeping than a man who is pretending to be
asleep. I
visited the National electric Power Authority NEPA’s website and
viewed with disgust the following ‘royal proclamation’ Today,
I have had to visit my electrician for the umpteenth time, my
Television, satellite decoder, fridge and several bulbs have been
hospitalized in his workshop for some time owing to Nepa’s ‘new
generation peak’ There
is serious power outage nationwide, during the dry season. The
explanation: the water level is low. During the rainy season we are told
the water level is very high. By
tariff
regime was unrealistic. The question is has the authority ever met any
challenge in the past? The fact remains providing any form of service at
a reasonable cost for the masses is always unrealistic be it water,
petroleum, transport down to education, we hear the same song of ‘not
possible’ The
Engineer MD further said that by 2007 they would match daily power
demand with supply. My friend there are only three things I know would
happen by 2007. One: you most likely would have kicked out to make room
for a new chap for the government of the day. Two: which is very, very
true is that the power demand you are yet to meet now would have
increased. 1999
to date the authority has expended over a hundred and five billion Naira
and nineteen billion in domestic loans to improve its services. Surprisingly
no new power stations have been built; rather Shell Petroleum
Development Company has acquired the Afam Power Station in Delta. I
remember when the late Prophet Bola Ige was fooled into making a
promise of providing electric power by A
look at the figures released by the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria
MAN made me weep albeit without tears, yet while laughing at our
hypocrisy. We want to create and protect Small and Medium Scale
Enterprises, when large industries dependence on NEPA is suicidal. The
dependence of manufacturers on NEPA is approximately 40.57%, while the
rest 59.43% was on generating set. On an average, organizations spend
three quarters of the year on generating sets. I believe this is what
the foreign investors want? To sell their generating sets. The
authority still managed to record a whooping 5.647,336,145.95 as revenue
for June 2004, multiply that by 12 months all things being equal. Yet
they owe the Nigerian Gas Company that owes the Nigerian
Telecommunication that owes NEPA that owes the Water Board that owes
contractors who never executed any project. God save Most
little businesses that run on NEPA have two-price list; one reads for
NEPA, the other for Generating sets. As I write despite the ‘stupid
celebration’ they have refused to tell us that they are currently
barely generating a capacity of 2,300MW. What has NEPA not blamed, from
water to consumers, its staff, the Nigerian Gas Company, fault ridden
billing system to only God knows what next. For
three years now, to sell the authority has been a case study in
confusion. The latest is to split the authority into 18 firms and sell
like AKARA (bean ball). When nations are celebrating years of
uninterrupted power supply, we are celebrating foolishness in darkness. Even
with the power we generate, I stand to be corrected that only 10% of
rural households and 40% of the entire nation have access to
electricity, infact an entire State like Ebonyi is not connected to the National
grid. Does
leadership realize how many industries whose profit and even existence
has been choked by the cost of having to maintain their own power
generating stations. I
know of cases where NEPA officials have been beaten, their offices
burnt. People get bills after months of ‘no light’ heavy tariffs
with maintenance charge for a meter that the consumer bought, yet does
not own. The
other day a friend went to complain about his bill which was obviously
overcharged, rather than explain he was just told to pay. Do Nigerians
deserve this treatment, can anything really work in this nation? NEPA,
like I always say have given Nigerians the 66-66 concoction. Six hours
of no electricity, six hours of low voltage light which mama’s
daughter mistook for candle light, six hours of high current that destroyed
my electrical appliances, and the last six hours spent repairing the
NEPA inflicted damaged transformer. Please like a friend puts it, read fast or less NEPA will soon take light. |