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Electricity meters to be sold at between N20,000 and N50,000


Electricity meters to be sold at N20,000, N50,000
Electricity consumers will pay between N20,000 and N50,000 to have meters, Chairman of the Nigerian Electricity Regulation Commission (NERC), Dr. Sam Amadi, has said, yesterday. The NERC boss said single phase meters would cost N20,000, while three phased meters would cost N50,000, payable to the electricity distribution company (DISCo) in the customers’ jurisdiction and to be supplied by it within 45 days of payment.

Speaking at a stakeholders’ workshop on the metering Code 2 regulation, which was attended by licensees and electricity consumers in Abuja, Amadi said the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP) has certified over 80 firms to become vendor installers, he said, adding that the specific cost for the different categories of meters would soon be made public as approved by the BPP. He admitted that the Multi-Year Tariff Order (MYTO) II which took effect last June did not work out as planned in terms of metering as the discos could not raise the required funds to procure meters.

In particular, Amadi blamed the 50 percent rise of staff salaries for workers of the discos for the problem. Amadi said: “The deficit is something you do gradually to ease it out but the point is that because of things beyond NERC. “Government is doing a reform and part of that reform is government wanted to discuss labour issues and the agreement also was to take 50 per cent increase in salaries, the DISCOs have got bloated personnel cost and one consequence of that is that they are not able to finance capital expenditures which one of them is metering,” he added.

According to him, the Credited Advance Payment for Metering Implementation (CAPMI) which provides that willing customers pay for their meters and stop paying the fix charge component of the tariff until the cost is defrayed became necessary due to the inability of MYTO II to close the metering gaps. The NERC chairman however said the CAPMI project was a short term measure to speed up the metering process.
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