Nigeria's President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is yet to utter a word after his government increased electricity tariff to 240 per cent .
The issue has now worsened the living condition of many Nigerians who have for months been lamenting about hardship and suffering due to high cost of food items.
The tariff hike came at a time the government had announced the removal of subsidy and the Naira floating policies implemented by Tinubu’s Government.
In defence of the hike, the Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu, noted last Friday that 85 per cent of electricity will not be affected.
He added that the Government would save N1.14 trillion in electricity subsidies.
Despite Adelabu’s position, the Nigeria Labour Congress, Trade Union Congress, Lagos Chambers of Commerce and Industry, and Abuja Chambers of Commerce and Industry have all openly condemned the new electricity tariff hike.
They all agreed there is a cloud of confusion around the tariff implementation amid economic hardship.
Upon the new tariff announcement by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission Tuesday last week, the eleven Discos began implementing the N255 kilowatt-hours rate for customers getting 20 hours.
However, the implementation has attracted widespread dissatisfaction among electricity consumers.
Abuja Electricity Distribution Company apologized to consumers for wrongly applying new tariff hikes on B, C, D, and E customers, who were categorized as getting 16 hours of power supply
Consequently, Abuja Disco was slammed with a fine of N200 million by NERC over the wrong billing of customers. The Commission also ordered the Disco to refund affected customers with energy tokens before 11 April, 2024.
Despite the sanction imposed on Discos, Nigerians are still apprehensive that all 12 million electricity consumers may bear the new tariff burden.
The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, FCCPC, confirmed this when it asked the Government to order Discos to meter all Band A customers within 60 days.
FCCPC also stated that consumers in Bands B, C, D, and E should not be migrated to Band A without being metered.
According to NERC data, only 5.7 million electricity consumers are metered, while around 6.3 million are unmetered.
The development further heightened the fears of arbitrary billing by Discos.
While the electricity hike subsisted, the power supply remained epileptic nationwide.
National grid collapse, repairs by the Transmission Company of Nigeria and fire incidents have resulted in downtime.
This year alone, the grid has collapsed three times.
Electricity supply has dropped significantly since January due to gas constraints.
Meanwhile, the latest gas price increase of 11 per cent has further worsened Nigeria‘s power sector challenges.
This is why Kunle Olubiyo, the Nigerian Consumer Protection Network President, said Nigerians have continued to pay tariffs for darkness.
The Senior Staff Association of Electricity and Allied Companies, in a statement by its National Secretary, Nnamdi Ajibo, called for a reversal of the electricity tariff hike.
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