Specifically, they accused the officials of the energy supplier, believed to be the largest electricity distribution company in Nigeria, of threatening to ‘’forcefully confiscate their meters under the pretext that the consumers were operating with what they termed ‘’old meters’’.

Thrice last week, the staff of the company from Igbobi Undertaking in the Somolu area of the State who mobilised to forcefully uninstall and cart the meters away were resisted.

‘’And, despite repeated explanations and appeals, the electricity company team said to be led by a male management of the company refused, bluntly to listen, saying that Ikeja Electric Distribution Company had already phased out ‘old meters’, the affected consumers stated.

‘’We further appealed to the officers that the meters were purchased by us and that it will be illegal to withdraw the meters  which we bought, without replacement.

‘’In fact, we told them that we are of the opinion that in normal a clime, the meters should be replaced when they are withdrawing the current ones instead of putting us in darkness.

‘’But to our dismay, they mobilised the second day, in multiples, apparently poised for a showdown with us.

‘’However, as law abiding citizens, we maintained our position that our meters were sold to us by Ikeja Electricity company and further our claims that we paid with Bank Drafts in favour of Ikeja Electric, yet they insisted on taking away our property’’, the customers said.

‘’Yet the team leader who  was simply called ‘Sam’, the Undertaking Manager told us that throughout the country, meters are the property of electricity distribution companies, hence they are at liberty to withdraw same anytime, even, without notice.

‘’Despite the argument that we would inform our lawyers about the development, for advise, the Ikeja Electric men re-surfaced the third day with ladders, threatening to illegally cart away our meters and we still, as gentlemen and law abiding citizens asked them to reason.

‘’At that point, one of them told us that he did not expect us to argue the matter because if occasion demands, he would never resist taking his own meter by the company.

The electricity company however said that customers with ‘old meter’ should apply for ‘new meter’ while they would be ‘put on estimates’ pending the approval of their application.

‘’We were mandated to pay for ‘new meters’ costing approximately N117,000.00  each, within 14 days, failure which the officials threatened to take “drastic action’’.

Similar situation was reported by a top Lagos civil servant at the Ipaja New Town Scheme, an estate flagged off by the Lagos State Government in Ilapo Village via AIT, Alagbado Lagos, who recently approached Ikeja Electric for the replacement of her damaged ‘Customer Card’ but was told to buy a new meter because the present one one was ‘outdated’.

According to the consumer, ‘’they bluntly told me l would need to immediately pay for a new one which l did not plan for due to the present economic realities’’.

Two of the affected consumers Mr. Dele Oguntayo, journalist  and Mr. Abass Adie, a businessman, narrated how the ‘bold-faced’ Ikeja Electric personnel swooped on his premises for the withdrawal of his meter to which he declined.

Oguntayo explained that he applied for a meter in year 2010 having paid N55,000.00 Bank Draft to Ikeja Electric and was not metered for several months.

While he was being issued what he termed ‘cut-throat estimated bills’ for about a year, he added that ‘’at a point, despite operating with a stand-by generator for several hours daily, the Ikeja Electric was billing him ‘’thousands of Naira every month.

‘’The meter l applied for in the first quarter of that year was not supplied until about a year after my application and payment despite repeated visits and pleas to the company.

‘’Something will interest you: A professional colleague in a news agency as Energy Correspondent in Lagos had come visiting; and, about a year after his first visit, he promised to take my matter up with the Managing Director of Ikeja Electric.

‘’He even challenged me that as a journalist, l should have approached either the company’s Head of  Public Affairs or better still, the Managing Director.

‘’So, less than 24 hours of his intervention, two meters were brought to me, same day, on the instruction of the Managing Director of Ikeja Electric!

‘’My conclusion then was that the officials were hoarding the meters for the highest bidders and did not attend to applicants, except through touts.

‘’It may interest you again that about ten years later, a female staff of the Ikeja Electricity Company who claimed to be of the marketing department came with another joker, claiming that the meter I was using was the allocation of a woman within the zone.

‘’She threatened to withdraw the meter because, according to her, l probably manipulated the system to secure the meter through the back-door.

‘’Consequently, I made several visits to see the Manager when they relocated to Obanikoro area of Ikorodu Road but was always told that their boss was busy.

‘’But when I spoke with one Mr. Ayeni, the Ikeja Electric spokesman on the telephone last week, about the recent threat and my resolve to brief a lawyer, he directed me to one Mrs. Ayanga, the Igbobi Business Manager who could still not be reached for an appointment.”

While reacting to the incident, Adie was of the view that upgrading of facilities, including the metering system was a welcome development and asked the company to phase payment of the new meter rather than putting consumers on estimated bills after withdrawal of the existing meters.

The post Consumers challenge Ikeja Electric over threat to withdraw pre-paid meters appeared first on Frontpageng.

Mrs Ndidi Mbah, TCN’s spokesperson stated in Abuja that the inferno burned off a large portion of the electricity conductor.

She stated also that the inferno triggered a resistant pull on the high-tension towers along the line route, causing five of them to collapse.

“The incident which is estimated to have occurred at about 12.29 a.m. on Friday, burnt a wide portion of the 330kv transmission line which wheels 145mw of bulk power to the Akangba Substation.

“The transmission towers affected are the two closest to the site of the inferno and three across the Lagos canal.

“As a result of the incident, there is a major reduction of bulk power wheeled to TCN’s 330/132/33kV Akangba Transmission Substation in Lagos,’’ she stated.

The substation takes supply from two different 330kv transmission lines, with the second being the redundant line, she added.

Mbah stated also that TCN would rearrange bulk electricity transmitted on that line route to the second 330kv line previously carrying 59mw.

She added that TCN was successfully back-feeding the substations affected by the towers’ collapse, while engineers were patrolling the second 330kv transmission line which tripped as a result of the incident.

“Once it is energised, supply will be restored to all the substations affected by the incident from the second 330kv transmission line.

“Load carried by the burnt 330kv line will now be transferred to the second line,’’ she also explained.

Mbah lamented that an incident such as that was a major setback to TCN’s efforts at implementing grid expansion and stability under its Electricity Grid Maintenance, Expansion and Rehabilitation Programme.

According to her, the re-erection of five towers and restringing of the 330kv transmission line was a major project that costs a lot of money and would take a while to complete.

She said that TCN was appealing to Nigerians to desist from activities such as fuel theft and other destructive tendencies as they all had very far-reaching negative effects on the nation.

“The issue of protecting national assets is imperative and must be taken seriously so that the stability of the nation’s network and the development of the nation are not compromised,’’ she stressed.

Source: NAN

The post TCN blames thieves for inferno, collapse of electricity high tension towers appeared first on Frontpageng.

Mr Olajide Kumapayi, Chief Technical Officer, Ikeja Electric, made the announcement at a news briefing on Monday in Ikeja.

Kumapayi said the project which would begin on October 11 was aimed at increasing the capacity of the transmission lines to wheel more power from the generation companies.

He noted that some of 132K lines installed over 50 years ago had become obsolete and degraded due to time and usage.

According to him, areas that will be affected by this stage of the project include Oregun, Police Training College, Oba Akran, Oke Ira, Ogba, Magodo , Anifowoshe and Omole Phase One.

Kumapayi said: “The TCN is currently embarking on the upgrade of the 132KV lines from Ikeja West to Ota and Alimosho in stages. This is the second stage.

“The TCN is replacing all the aluminum conductors with gap conductors which is more sophisticated to withstand heat and has more capacity to carry current.

“The implication of this is that from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. everyday, the substations controlling these areas will be switched off which will affect the feeders connected to them.

“This will affect all categories of customers within the area especially our Maximum Demand (MD) customers such as Ikeja City Mall, Police College, Lagos State University Teaching Hospital and the Ikeja High Court.”

He added that the TCN would also move to Alimosho and Agege axis during the next stage.

Kumapayi noted that the upgrade was a power sector initiative to boost transmission and distribution of electricity to Nigerians.

Also, Mr Felix Ofulue, Head, Corporate Communications, Ikeja Electric, said the DisCo had written to the customers notifying them of the situation.

Ofulue said the company was also meeting with its bilateral power supply agreement partners and appealed to all those affected to exercise patience with the DisCo during the period.

“Even though this is a TCN project, it is our duty to inform our customers of the situation because we are the ones that interface with them on a daily basis.

“We believe it will be for the benefit of our customers at the end of the day and will also allow Ikeja Electric to invest more in our system to improve power supply to customers under our network,” Ofulue said.

Source: NAN

The post Ikeja Electric lists areas to experience outage from October 11 appeared first on Frontpageng.

The agreement between Lagos State government and the energy firms signed will also include distribution of free prepaid metres to low income areas, with the pilot phase of 20,000 metres to be distributed in Alimosho local government area of the state.

Speaking during the signing of the agreement at the Lagos State Secretariat, Alausa, the Commissioner for Energy and Mineral Resources, Mr. Olalere Odusote, said the aim of the agreement was to increase power supply to at least 22 hours daily, from about eight to 12 hours daily.

The Commissioner said the implementation would start immediately, adding that Lagos State government had identified a number of feeders that can provide power in 20,000 low income areas with plans to replicate the initiative across the state.

He said: “This Memoranda of Agreement is to ensure the provision of uninterrupted power to residents, especially the low income areas. It is also part of efforts to solve the problem of metering and infrastructure deficit to ensure these areas get power supply which is also measurable.

“The 20,000 metres have been procured by the state government and would be distributed free to low income areas in Alimosho Local Government Area as the pilot phase. Our intention is to replicate this gesture in other areas of the state once the pilot phase is successfully executed.

“We have identified a number of feeders that can provide power in these communities and implementation would start immediately.”

Also speaking, the Managing Director of Ikeja Electricity Distribution Company, IKEDC, Folake Soetan, expressed the firm’s readiness to support Lagos State government in ensuring uninterrupted power supply to residents of the state.

In his address, the Managing Director of Sahara Power Group, Anthony Youdeowei, said his company would be transparent in its dealings with the Lagos State government and Ikeja Electric to provide power supply for Lagosians.

The post Lagos, energy firms agree on improved power supply appeared first on Frontpageng.

The acting Chief Commercial Officer, Ikeja Electric, Ugochukwu Obi-Chukwu, made this known on Tuesday in Lagos.

Obi-Chukwu said his organisation had just completed meter installation for all residents of Unilag Estate in Isheri, adding that metering of Magodo residents had also commenced.

He said that the service would be extended to the entire business unit in the next few weeks.

“This exercise is part of the company’s efforts to bridge the metering gap under its network,” he said in a statement by Mr Felix Ofulue, Head, Corporate Communication Unit, IE,

Obi-Chukwu said that the exercise was also in line with the directive of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), promising that the organisation would be deploying meters in phases.

According to him, the deployment of meters would start with Shomolu, Ikorodu and Abule-Egba Business Units, while the second phase would include Akowonjo, Ikeja and Oshodi Business Units.

“We have commenced metering in the University of Lagos Estate, Magodo and some other areas as a pilot scheme.

“It is the unique demography of these areas that has made the survey of customers very easy,” he said.

The acting chief commercial officer advised customers to make payment based on the survey, adding that meters would be installed within 10 days after payment.

Obi-Chukwu, however, cautioned against meter bypass, warning that offenders would be prosecuted.

“The company has put measures in place to ensure that the meters are not by-passed, and there are monitoring team patrolling on daily basis to check the meters.

“Whoever is caught by-passing his/her meter will be made to pay N50,000 fine for single-phase meter and N100,000 fine for three-phase meter.

“Also, such customers will be charged for loss of revenue and be billed backward, as will be determined by Ikeja Electric.

“The fine depends on the nature and level of the by-pass,” he said.

Source:  NAN

The post Ikeja Electric begins meters rollout for customers appeared first on Frontpageng.