Ishiagu community petitions NERC over power outage, outrageous bills

The Ishiagu community in Ivo Local Government area of Ebonyi has decried the continued power outage in the area.

Mr Stanley Anyim, the President of Ishiagu Community Development Union (ICDU), who spoke to our reporter on Thursday in Enugu on behalf of his community, said the community had been without electricity for over a year.

Anyim told NAN that the community had petitioned the Nigeria Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) to complain that the community was being marginalised and also being exploited by the high electricity bills given by the Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC).

“From December 2016 till date, our community has not seen light from the EEDC, yet the company keeps bringing bills to power consumers in the community,” he said.
Anyim said: “more worrisome is the fact that the distribution company keeps bringing us huge estimated bills for energy not consumed.

“Before the final power outage, the company was in the habit of bringing exploitative bills to us for light it never supplied as we could barely have light for up to a period of three days in a whole month.

“Monthly estimated energy bills for ranged between N300, 000 to N700 000 depending on number of consumers to a transformer.

“We have severally taken our complaint to the area office of the company in Abakaliki to draw attention to the plight of the community and to demand for pre-paid meters for the transformers, but all to no avail.

“The inability of the EEDC to address the situation compelled the community to petition the NERC.

“Businesses, commercial and social activities have been negatively impacted due to the absence of power supply to the community, ” Anyim said.

He said that the community would not relent in its quest to compel the electricity distribution company to restore power to the community.

He vowed to use every legal means to achieve the goal.

Mr Cyprien Nwankwoegu, the Territorial Manager of EEDC in Ebonyi, confirmed the power outage problem in Ishiagu, but said that efforts were on to address it and restore power supply to the area.

“Our commitment is to ensure that our customers are given the best of services and to get satisfaction for their money.

“The situation in Ishiagu is being addressed and I can assure the people that light will soon be restored to the area.

“The company is interfacing with the leadership of the community to find a solution to problems that led to the power outage.

“We are dialoguing and I’m certain that the problem will be resolved very soon, ” Nwankwoegu said.