Some business owners have decried the drop in power supply by Ikeja Electric (IE) Plc and Eko Electricity Distribution Company (EKEDC) in some parts of Lagos State.
In separate interviews on Saturday, the business owners said the state had witnessed epileptic power supply in the past few weeks.
Confirming the situation on Saturday in a statement on its website, EKEDC said there was a significant drop in load allocation to its network from the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN).
However, a printer, Yakuba Aigbona, said the power situation in the Coker area of Surulere had been very poor.
“It is unfortunate that I have to rely on a generator for running my business, and with the high cost of diesel, things have not been easy,” Mr Aigbona said.
Another businessman, Michael Ajakaiye, said he was paying about N40,000 bill monthly for his three-bedroom office without enjoying regular supply.
“My office is at Lagos Island, and I can tell you categorically that the supply has dropped in recent weeks, and we have been relying on a generator to run our operations,” he said.
Uche Madu, a beer parlour operator in the Iyana-Ipaja area, said the epileptic power supply was affecting his business, forcing him to close two hours earlier than the usual time.
“We close around 9:00 p.m. now because there is no light, and we cannot power our generator when the customers are few,” he said.
The All Electricity Consumers Protection Forum group had written a letter to the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), urging the body to halt the implementation of Service Reflective Tariffs (SRT) by the DisCos.
The letter signed by the group’s national coordinator, Adeola Samuel-Ilori, said the DisCos had failed to live up to their end of the bargain of providing a quality electricity supply to Nigerians, which informed the increase in tariffs.
Under the SRT, the tariff classification is based on the quality of service and, therefore, divided into five Bands (A to E).
This is measured by the average availability of power supply over a month, interruptions (frequency and duration), voltage levels and other service parameters.
With the revised tariff regime, Non-MD customers in Band A, with a minimum of 20 hours daily, are paying N51.22/Kwh.
Band B customers with a minimum of 16 hours daily are expected to be charged N46.93/Kwh, while Band C customers with a minimum of 12 hours daily would be charged N37.95/Kwh.
Customers in Bands D and E, with a minimum of eight hours and four hours per day, respectively, were not impacted by the tariff revision.
(NAN)
