Electricity expert advocates improvement in distribution networks
NAN-HE-13
Network
By Kingsley Okoye
Abuja, April 21,2017(NAN) Dr Joy Ogaji, a power expert, has called on Electricity Distribution Companies(DISCOs) to improve the capacity of their distribution networks to accommodate power generated and wheeled to them for distribution.
Ogaji made the call in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Friday.
Ogaji, who is also the Executive Secretary, Association of Power Generation Companies (APGC), also said it was important DISCOs embarked on line tracing of tress under its distribution networks to avoid electrocution in the wet season.
“Since the DISCOS took over, they have a capacity of 4,600 network and they are still maintaining it.
“They have not done anything to improve the network; this was resulting in the loss of electricity meant for distribution.
“Now rains are coming, and you can see some trees are over grown and touching on their networks.
“Part of what they are supposed to do is to remove all those trees, we call it line tracing to ensure that when rains come, people will not be electrocuted.“
She said it was a sad experience for Nigerians to continue to experience blackout whenever it rained.
“ In Nigeria, once there is rain, there is likelihood that the light will go off, why do they put off the light?
“This is due to lack of line tracing, they don’t cut this tress regularly to avoid the trees touching the distribution lines and if it touches during rain and thunder, there will be electrocution all over.
“So, what they do in order to ensure safety, they just trip off the light, and nobody will have light until it stops raining for that day.”
According to her, it is time Nigerians begin to ask questions on the operations in the sector, adding that the privatisation of the sector is meant to bring an improvement to the sector.
“Why did government privatise the power sector; if things will remain the same, government needs to hold the companies to ransom and say please you need to perform.“
Mr Azu Obiaya, the Chief Executive Officer, Association of Electricity Distribution Companies (ANEDC), said that DISCOs had made some appreciable progress and investment since it began operation.
He said the DISCOs had made some investment since it began operation and recorded an improvement in electricity distribution in its franchise areas.
Obiaya said in spite of the challenges being experienced, significant improvement had been recorded in the metering system by the DISCOs.
He said that the electricity company had established call centres to handle over 2 million calls of customers complaints and also expand its distribution networks.
“There is improvement in health and safety requirement, replacement of several injection boxes, procurement of transformers, establishment of vending system for payment of electricity bill, among others.
Obiaya said the major challenge of the DISCOs was fund, adding that it was difficult to fully attain improvement if the tariff paid, did not recuperate the capital expenditure of the operators.
He, however, expressed belief that given the adoption of a cost reflective tariff and the injection of funds to make required investments, the sector would record further success. (NAN)
KC/BOLA/IA
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Edited by Bola Akingbehin/Idris Abdulrahman