Incessant Blackout: Energy Consumers In Lagos Island Battles Eko Power Holdings, Gives 24hrs Ultimatum To Restore Light Or Face Attack

By Raheem Ibrahim

Residents of Lagos Island on Monday morning shutdown the Power Holdings Company of Nigeria (PHCN) head office at Marina being use by Eko Electricity Distribution Company (EKEDC), for four hours, protesting against total power blackout for four weeks,

The protesters, numbering over 600 residents on the Island who gave 24 hours ultimatum for restoration of light in their respective areas, stormed the EKEDC head office, barricaded the entrance and the major Marina road for about four hours, chatting war songs and threatened to burn down the building if the officials failed to attend and address their problems.

However, the DPO of Lion building Police station, Mr Ishola who used his professional experience to parsuade the protesters to allow motorists involved in the heavy traffic which had escalated to all roads on Island, to move.

With his appeal that it’s their rights to protest but should not destroy or vandalise anything, the protesters gave way to the motorists to ease the tension.

The first batch of the protesters, led by consumers’ Chairmen of eight transformers on Adeniji Adele feeder turned deaf ears to pleads by the securitymen attached to the office, insisted not to leave the premises until the PHCN senior officials come down to address their plights.

When the EKEDC senior officials eventually came, the Chairman of all the Chairmen of the affected transformers, Prince Ojulari Olatunji Lateef in his address, lamented that the erratic power supply to their areas started early this year and whenever they complained to the undertaking manager at both Idumagbo and Ajele, they were persuaded to go with assurance that something better will be done.

According to him, “Instead of the expected better improvement, it became worst and to add to our wound, your office increased the bill by 400 percent and anyone who failed to pay 2/3 or full amount will have his or her wire disconnected from poll”.

“The light will be on around 10am and turned off at about 11.30am. They restored the light around midnight and off it by 4am. At times, there will be no light for two or three days but when they bring bill, person residing in one room apartment who leaves for work as early as possible and returned in the evening, will be forced to pay N35,000 to N40,000. When we complained, the officials will tell us that they are doing their job and if we don’t agree, we should go to their head office to complain.

“We usually appealed to our people that things will change for better soon. Now, for the past four weeks, we don’t have light at all and when they brought the bills, person paying N25,000 now charged N52,000. We can’t take it anymore. Come and remove your wires in our areas or it may be vandalized by miscreants whom we can’t identified and we will not be responsible for it.

“Our demands include the restoration of the light within 24 hours, review the billing by reducing the exhobitant accumulated debt for light we don’t use. No more one day off, two days on, set-up a monitoring committee who will be visiting our areas from time to time and be having meeting with us regularly”, he remarked.

Corroborating his demands, one of the transformers Chairman, Mr Nojimu Oladeinde also called for prompt attention of the technicians who address faults, revealing “whenever we have fault and call these people, they extort money from us before they carry-out the necessary work. Though, we are not complaining on that because residents too always contribute token to support the PHCN”.

“The exhobitant bills are deliberate because there meters attached to each transformer on energy supplied doesn’t correspondence with the amount they brought for us. You should know that we too are monitoring everything. Enough of this manipulation and forceful extortion”, he said.

He added, “Their meters read N1.7million and they bring us N7million to us to pay. Enough is enough”.

Responding to the protesters demands, the MD of Eko distribution, Mrs Rekia who led other officials appealed to them and asked for 24 hours to address all the points made.

While denying awareness of the consumers’ plight, she pledged to look into it and get back to the people.

Also appealing to the crowds, the head of Technical section, Engineer Okpo and the director of Service Management, Ayo Taiwo assured that things will be better now for the consumers.

While the first batch are leaving the area, another batch from Freeman and Tapa streets also came to make their complains too.

However, the protesters who came with their respective bills dumped them at the premises for the PHCN officials to look into it.