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Following the dismal state of energy supply in the country, the Federal Government has gone hard non-performing electricity distribution companies (DISCOs), thus issued a marching order to the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), to withdraw licenses of such DISCOs.
The federal government accused the DISCOs of not doing enough to improve energy supply despite the availability of power on the national grid.
The Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu stated this during a meeting with the head of the agencies under the ministry in Abuja, stressing that the distribution segment remains the weakest link in the electricity supply value chain.
He further accused the DISCOs of not doing enough to improve energy supply despite the availability of power on the national grid. He insisted that the franchise areas covered by the DISCOs were too large, adding that the government would pursue a restructuring that would create smaller DISCOs with companies restricted to one state respectively.
Adelabu pointed out that willful refusal by any DISCO to take up available power “is a qualified basis for the revocation of licenses too”, adding that the distribution companies must be ready to pick up 90-99 percent of supply allocated to them.
He described the ongoing electricity rationing across the country as unacceptable, disclosing the government plans to improve power generation from the present 4,000MW to 6,000MW in the next six months.
Adelabu tasked NERC to look for creative ways of getting the DISCOs to improve supply including the imposition of stiff sanctions on utilities which fail to pick their allocations and outright cancellation of licences.
Checks by NaijaTimes on Month-on-Month (MoM) power generation showed that generation has dropped to 3,475MW this month, from 4,043MW last month, thus causing many DISCOs to embark on loading shedding.
Meanwhile, on Year-on-Year (YoY), checks also revealed that power generation dropped by 21 per cent to 3,475MW this month, from 4,404MW in the corresponding period of 2023, a situation blamed to many problems, especially low investment and inadequate gas supply.
Data obtained from the National System Operator, a unit in the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), indicated that supply remains low, thus negatively impacting households and businesses nationwide.
