Residents in Bauchi state have lamented the poor supply of power by the Jos Electricity Distribution Company (JEDC) with some of them calling for improvement in service delivering while others asking the federal government to take back the company in the interest of national development.
For Malam Najib Sani, the only way out of poor power supply in the country is for the government to revoke the licences issued to the various electricity distribution companies in the country.
“Government should have their license revoked and give it to those who can supply adequate power to the country because it is high time for Nigerian citizens to be getting adequate power supply to run their businesses”, he opined.
Another resident is also of the opinion that the companies handling the business of electricity in the country are not capable of doing it and as such, government should take it back to salvage the situation.
On his part, Danlami Babantakko called on the government to declare a state of emergency on the power sector, saying “as far as power distribution is concerned nothing has change since Nigerian Government handed over the sector to private organizations.
Another resident alleged that in his area, they sometimes spend eight hours without power and are still compelled to pay exorbitant amounts at the end of the month for the light they did not consumed.
Some of the residents alleged that areas where prepaid metres are installed get more supply of the electricity compared to those areas that don’t have the prepaid metres which is dominated by the masses that hardly get two hours uninterrupted power supply, adding that they are been overcharged on the estimated billing system.
Responding, the regional manager of the company in Bauchi, Auwal Baba Jada said some areas get less electricity supply because their transformers have been overloaded and as such, the company do switch them off for some hours of the day for the transformers to rest.
The manager who gave the clarification on the issues raised by the residents in Bauchi in an interview with newsmen on Wednesday in his office also revealed that Bauchi state government is owing JEDC the sum N2.3 billion as debt from 2013 to date.
According to Baba Jada, goverment has not been paying more than 50 per cent of its monthly bills as at when due.
According to him, despite the huge unpaid bills owed by both government and residents, the company supplies a minimum of six hours power in all parts of the state capital per day.
Jada advocated the purchase of either prepaid or postpaid meters by customers saying they are more effective and efficient as people are only charged base on their consumption.
The JEDC manager further explained that prepaid meters are paid before the installation while in post paid meters, people pay at the end of the month according to what they consume.
He also claimed that it is the duty of the federal government to provide the power transformers because they are expensive while JEDC provides only distribution transformers.
