The Eko Electricity Distribution Company, EKEDC, has appealed to customers to report any person or group of individuals posing as staff of Eko Disco to the company or any security agency.
Dr. Tinuade Sanda, MD/CEO, Eko Electricity Distribution Company, who made the appeal at a press conference in Lagos,also wooed customers in the fight against vandalism in her company.
“I am therefore calling on our customers, security agencies and most importantly the media, and the public to be vigilant and assist us in this fight against vandalism within our franchise area and put an end to these incessant acts of criminality.”
The company has lost estimated sum of N4 billion to vandalism of its assets as acts of vandalism reportedly escalates within its network in the last six months,she said
She also said that the spate of vandalism within the network iescalated n the last few weeks, especially in Mushin, Yaba, Surulere, Ijora, Apapa, and Lagos Island.
She added that her company has written to regulatory authorities including the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC, the Bureau of Public Enterprises, BPE, the Police and other security agencies about the situation.
According to her, apart from the electricity supply gap from national grid, due to challenges such as shortage of gas supply, a drop in power generation and recurrent system collapse of the national grid, vandalism is creating service disruption within its franchise area.
She added: “These challenges have adversely affected the supply of power to our customers. However, I would like to reiterate to our esteemed customers that we are actively engaging the other stakeholders in the industry to provide solutions to these problems.These cases of vandalism have contributed in no small measure to the prolonged outages in our network, leading to disruptions of many businesses, maiming/injury, and loss of lives, particularly of innocent and unsuspecting members of the public.
She lamented that the menace has made it difficult for the company to provide adequate electricity to its customers whilst also posing a serious threat to its distribution infrastructure, especially the electricity cables.
She said:“Specifically, I would like to mention that a company that goes by the name Yunusa S. Power Global Services Limited is not our agent and does not have our mandate to carry out any form of excavation on any electrical or cable installations within our network.Eko Disco operations are carried out only by our authorized staff and operatives who can be easily identified with the EKEDC branded coveralls and jackets.
She disclosed that company currently receives 11 per cent of present generation capacity from the national grid which she said is inadequate to serve its customers.
