The Chairman, Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), Dr Sam
Amadi, has said that the commission will not increase energy tariff for
residential buildings until June.
NERC on December 23, 2014 approved the review of the Multi Year Tariff
Order (MYTO) 2.1 regime with take-off date of Jan. 1 for commercial consumers.
Amadi, who made the explanation in Abuja on Tuesday at a news
conference, said the review was not expected to bring about any increase
in tariff to residential customers on R2, who formed 80 per cent of electricity
consumers, till June.
“Let me state upfront for the sake of clarity that NERC has not
increased tariff for residential consumers for now.
“While the scheduled increase will apply to other classes of consumers
from Jan. 1, it will not affect residential consumers until June 2015,”he said.
Amadi said the decision to begin the implementation of the residential
tariff in June was to balance the legitimate demand for adequate electricity
supply with new charges.
“The freeze was designed to primarily protect and promote the interest
of the consumers as well as stimulate operators to serve customers better,” he
said.
He said it would be unfair for the commission to ask consumers to pay
higher tariffs given the current level of service delivery and consumption
perceptions.
Amadi said although electricity distribution companies were not happy
about the phased approach to increase in tariff, the commission had a
responsibility to protect consumers.
On metering, the chairman said the commission was not satisfied with
the level of meter deployment by electricity distribution companies.
He said that NERC expected the companies to use the next six months to
improve on their meter spread.
Amadi said the commission was taking some regulatory measures to ensure
that distribution companies provided meters for consumers. (NAN)
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