FCCPC Advocates Structural Approach To Tackle Electricity Issues

The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) has advocated for a more structural approach to tackle increasing issues in the power sector.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the FCCPC, Babatunde Irukera made this known in an interview in Abuja on Sunday.

Irukera said that one of the approaches toward resolving electricity issues could be the implementation of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) Billing Cap Order.

The order issued by NERC states that “DisCos shall ensure that all customers on tariff Class A1 are properly identified and metered by April 30, 2020.

R2 single-phase customers now have an energy cap of 78kwhr per month and a tariff of N24kwhr. The maximum such a customer will be billed is N1,872 per month.

According to him, FCCPC has succeeded tremendously with respect to resolving complaints.

“However, the fact that there are that many complaints on a daily basis, shows that a far more structural or industry-wide approach to resolving the problem of the industry must be adopted.

“We cannot resolve complaints as fast as the number of complaints that comes in.

“We have gone to Lagos, Benin, Port Harcourt to resolve 100s of complaints and we are not talking about the number of complaints that come to us routinely and we are resolving.

“We resolved more electricity complaints this year more than we have done in any year but that the problem still remains shows that there is something structural that needs to be fixed.

“One of it is the estimated billing, we have no control over how quickly consumers can be metered but we are advocating, insisting, and engaging to ensure that happens.

“The DisCos strongly oppose the regulation and we strongly support it and want to proceed to mutual and joint enforcement and those conversations are ongoing on what is a fair common ground on how to enforce those regulations,’’ he explained.

The chief executive officer noted that the same structural approach was also needed to solve the issues around the aviation industry.