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NECAN says meters are outdated
- Alleges consumers in the South-South, South-West are victims
- Says a larger number of consumers are still unmetered
The Network for Electricity Consumers Advocacy of Nigeria (NECAN) has challenged the Distribution Companies (DisCos) claim of improved metering of consumers. The Secretary of the Organisation, Uket Obonga, called into question the figures of metered consumers as seen in the media in recent times. He made this ascertain while in a phone call interview with correspondents from the Leadership Newspapers.
Obonga said most consumers especially those in the South-West and South-South remain unmetered. He also claims that a lot of metered consumers are stuck with old analogue meters incapable of accurately calculating consumption. “The metering itself has a question mark on it. If you go to some DisCos, particularly in the South-South and South-West, majority of the so-called metered customers are on these old analogue NEPA meters which are not functional” he said.
Responding to these claims, the Executive Director, Association of Nigerian Electricity Distributors (ANED), Mr. Sunday Oduntan, called the allegations baseless as customers on analogue meters were never included in the list of metered consumers. He said, “The DisCos each has a record of such people who have analogue meters and count them as customers without meters and that is why they are on estimated billing pending when they would be given the smart meters. So when you hear that this population of customers has been metered in a particular place; it is those who have prepaid meters installed for them”.