The Nigerian Electricity Management Services Agency (NEMSA) has disclosed plans to take legal action against electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos) that fail to act on a directive it gave for the upgrade of old and weak installations in their franchise states.
NEMSA had given the 11 DisCos in the country a two-month enforcement notice to effect changes in their distribution networks which are not safe, blaming the electrocution incident in Calabar last year on it.
Speaking during an oversight by the Senate Committee on Power to the agency yesterday, the Managing Director and Chief Electrical Inspector of the Federation, Engr. Tukur Tahir Aliyu, said following the expiration of the notice, some DisCos have written to the agency on how they plan to replace old installations on networks while others are yet to respond.
“We have issued an enforcement directive to all the utility companies about some of the violations we noticed across the country. The timeline has elapsed and a number of them have responded to the directive and they have given us plans on how to go about rectifying those things. So, we have given them another timeline.
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“For those who have not responded, our field officers are on ground to bring out the violations and once these have been catalogued, definitely, the enforcement notice will be issued to them before we now issue enforcement and then go for prosecution if nothing has been done.”
Tahir also lamented the long process it takes to prosecute electricity offenders in court, and appealed to the Senate for the amendment of the 2023 Electricity Act to make provisions for an Electricity Offences Tribunal.
“NEMSA also needs an in-house counsel with powers to prosecute electricity offences for standardisation of networks and safety of lives and properties, and technical regulations made by NERC should apply across multi-tier levels.”
On his part, the chairman of the committee, Sen. Enyinnaya Harcourt Abaribe, lamented the frequent grid collapse despite the huge money sunk in the sector over the years.
He assured that the Senate will look into how NEMSA could be given regulatory power to sanction those found culpable in contravening safety standards in the power sector.
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