The Federal Government has dismissed claims that it will dismantle the power Distribution Companies (DisCos) but warned them to improve on electricity supply.
The Minister of State for Power, Mr Goddy Jedy-Agba disclosed this on Thursday when he inspected the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company (AEDC),on saying he had gone to some DisCos, and would visit others soon.
“I don’t think anybody is thinking of dismantling DisCos, we are thinking of revamping DisCos and adding to them to make them better. Not to dismantle them.
“To a very large extent, I am satisfied with what I have seen and heard. AEDC is a one stop centre for power distribution in Nigeria. This DisCo is doing very well and a little more effort will make them to be world class.” Agba said.
The minister said other DisCos must improve service delivery by copying AEDC. “The DisCos should copy what AEDC has here. If others copy this, we will have improvement in services. Others are doing well but they could do better.”
Agba also assured AEDC that meter import duty issue will be solved. He said, “Government is working on that already and I am very sure very soon, you will hear the news.”
In his remarks, the Managing Director of AEDC, Engr. Ernest Mupwaya, said the DisCo has recently installed 100,000 meters through the Meter Asset Providers (MAP) scheme but decried high import duty for meters.
He also said AEDC has increased energy bills collection to N6.5 billion while remitting N4bn of that every month.
“For AEDC, our energy price has risen by over 130% but our bill to the customer only went up by 16%. If you look at the quantum of what we are paying, you will see that we pay in the region of N4bn which is an improvement from the time of takeover,” Mupwaya noted.
