BY TIMOTHY AGBOR, OSOGBO
The Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company has charged customers under its jurisdiction to expose vandals and other elements who use electricity illegally by bypassing their meters.
If they fail to do the needful, IBEDC said that innocent customers would end up bearing the brunt of energy theft, vandalism and sundry other criminalities perpetrated by unscrupulous elements.
In an exclusive interview with The Point in Osogbo, Kikelomo Owoeye, the Osun Regional Communication Officer of IBEDC, said sharp practices by some electricity consumers resulted in economic sabotage and losses to the company as well as the Federal Government.
In order to avert such, Owoeye urged customers not to turn blind eyes to vandals and those engaging in illegal connection, bypassing of meters and other unlawful activities.
She said, “We have been sensitising residents to desist from energy theft, vandalism, bypassing of meters and illegal connection. All these vices are not only affecting us as a company, they are also affecting our customers. For instance, if a customer is illegally connected in one area, definitely, it is going to affect those who are legally connected in that area.
“What I am trying to say is that by the time they are connecting illegally, the transformer they use in the area might be overloaded. In the process of illegal connection, once there is a spark, it bounces back on the customers as it diminishes the life span of the transformer. It can even affect some vital components in the transformer.
“If we have about 200 customers on our data base while about 1000 people are actually making use of the energy, automatically, it’s those who are on our database that will be billed for the quantum of energy used. The billings becomes high as a result of those who are unmetered customers.
That means that those who are on our database will be paying for those who are connecting illegally. This is responsible for estimated billings and that’s why we advise our customers to always look out for those who are stealing energy in their areas and expose them.”
“Most of our customers tend to turn blind eyes when they see such illegal activities. They would say it does not affect them but it does. By the time their bills come out, it would affect them and by the time their transformer packs up, it would affect them. It is economic sabotage. It attracts seven-year imprisonment if convicted,” owoeye stated.
“Such practices drag us back from improving or projecting as a company. We always tell our customers that they have the right to arrest anyone found tampering with their transformer and hand such a person over to security agencies for questioning,” she noted.
