Ibafo residents warn IBEDC – We‘ll Not Take This Act Of Injustice Again

By Olufemi Ajadi

Electricity consumers in the Ibafo area of Ogun State are angry with their electricity distribution company over what they call injustice in their billings and charges.

And the community is not leaving it at just that: it had warned the authorities of the distribution company to stop such actis forthwith, or face the consequences.

The petition, signed by Comrade Muyiwa Oyetunde, For IBAFO registered light users, and made available to The Eagle correspondent, said the only way it could describe the attitude of the organisation towards the residents was one of injustice. The full letter is produced below:

“I want to draw the attention of IBEDC Regional Manager And Business Manager Mowe/Ibafo Axis  to above subject matter.

It is no more news that Ibafo light users experienced upward movement of billing toward north with respect to October billing which was more than 100% increment compared to September billing. For instance a customer that was billed N2, 000 for September was slammed a charge of N 4.500 for October! The major two reason given my IBEDC for this unjustified act were:

1.Due to light users that are not registered

2.The energy used in October is far higher that the one consumed in September.

Our reaction to the above are as follows:

1. UNREGISTERED CUSTOMER:

IBDC in its own wisdom told us that part of the billing we are paying belongs to the unregistered light users! Why should we pay for the food we didn’t eat? Why should we pay for the service not rendered? This is act of an injustice of highest order which is criminal in nature. In as much we don’t support people using light without paying, we want to tell IBDC that it is not a function of any community to fish out any unregistered light users for them. Must Community do everything for IBEDC? We bought transformer and all other electrical infrastructure for them, must we also tell them those that need or need not to register? NO. This is a criminal act and we want to believe that the month of October will be the last month that it will exist. If we experience this in November billing, we shall resist it in all ratification

2.Concerning the assertion that October energy consumption is far higher than September’s, when will we start calling a spade a spade? When will IBEDC be honest for once? When will  IBEDC be transparent for once? Has the agency forgotten that we have its ENERGY MONTHLY SCORE CARD? Let’s see the comparism below:

SEPTEMBER

Total hour (energy)for month of September=123.03Hr

%Energy used=121.03/720*100=16.8%

OCTOBER

Total hour(energy) for month of October=143.29Hr

%Energy used=143.29/744*100=19.24%

From above analysis we have a variance of +2.44% September compare to October meaning that for example a customer that collected a bill of N2,500 in September ought to collect a bill of N2,561 in October but what justification did IBEDC has for given he that collected N2,500 in September, N5,000 in October?

We from customer’s angle we want to use this medium to inform IBEDC that this will be the last time we will take this act of an injustice from them. Any attempt or attempted attempt or group of attempt to repeat same in November or future will be resisted with full force taking appropriate law into consideration.

We are not surprise that this script from IBEDC has been rehearsed for long. A worker once said: “This IBAFO people self, they are not enlighten. They don’t know difference from right and left. We have arrived to exploits them” May I say that IBAFO people are very articulate, vibrant, friendly but will not take any form of injustice

With due respect, I want to repeat that the abnormal and crazy bill circulated for October by IBEDC should be the last as we shall not welcome any future abnormal bill. The only going forward is that IBEDC should ensure that they give a standard and justifiable Pre paid meter to over 70% light users that have registered before year end

We shall pass across a copy of this message to Ogun state house of Assembly and the Media

God bless IBEDC. God bless IBAFO registered light users.

Comrade Muyiwa Oyetunde

For:IBAFO registered light users”