Business
FG Accuses Discos Of Rejecting Power Allocations
As Nigerians grapple
with the challenges of inadequate electricity supply, the federal government has accused some electricity distribution companies (DISCOs), of rejecting power allocated to them for distribution to customers.
Speaking to newsmen during a recent visit to Lagos State, the Minister of Power, Prof Chindu Nebo wondered why DISCOs would reject power when Nigerians did not have enough supply.
Nebo noted that some of the challenges militating against adequate supply of electricity in Nigeria were deliberate attempts by some people to punish Nigerians.
He warned that any company that rejects power allocated to it would be sanctioned by the federal government.
“Do you know that some distribution companies reject power given to them? I had to make a pronouncement that if a distribution company rejects power it will be penalised” he said.
The power minister explained that if such companies were named Nigerians would be shocked.
He explained that he had to climb the ministry’s five storey building for weeks because they “starved me and other ministries”.
According to him, at a time the companies claimed the Power Ministry was not paying them even as he said it turned out that only his ministry was actually paying while others were not.
“Even when there is power and all payments made, we do not have power so I had to invade the company.
“When I called and looked, I saw that they had already been noted for rejecting power.
“Since that time till now, we have been getting more steady power supply, so sometimes some of these things are deliberate” he said.
Nebo also warned against any form of monopoly and unionisation by the distribution companies adding that any investor that wants to build mini power plants can feed it into the grid but not necessarily the transmission gid.