Nigeria Grapples Seven million Metering Gap
As Nigeria battles perennial shortage in electricity supply, bringing millions of its consumers under a more accountable, transparent metering system has remained even a more herculean task over the years.
The government and the power distribution companies (DisCos) have also continued to complain of revenue shortfalls in the sector.
As at September 30, 2023, Nigeria’s metering gap stood at over 7 million – though reports suggest it could be more than that. This is amid frequent grid collapse, which as at today, seems to have defied solutions.
A report by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) shows that out of the total 12,825,005 registered electricity customers, only 5,707,838 have meters, indicating that over 7.1 million registered customers still are subjected to the estimated billing system.
To close this gap, President Bola Tinubu-led administration recently established a Presidential Metering Initiative, which was announced by Adebayo Adelabu, minister of power.
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The minister, who put the metering shortfall at 8 million, reiterated the federal government’s commitment to eliminate estimated billing by the end of 2024 and close the gap within the space of three to five years, through the new initiative.
“Citizens are tired of estimated billing because it always leads to cheating between consumers, staff and company. Before the end of this year, we are looking at the possibility of ending estimated billing because we want transparency and objectivity in our billing system,” Adelabu said, even though he did not elaborate on the modalities for the new initiative and specific targets.
“We have up to eight million meters gap in Nigeria and what the initiative seeks to achieve is to close this gap within three to five years. This means that an average of two million meters is required on a yearly basis and achieving the target is compulsory for citizens to enjoy stable power supply,” he added.
However, this is not the first attempt at ensuring adequate metering for electricity customers; several past governments had rolled out ambitious targets and plans to tackle the issue but failed to deliver as expected.
Experts remain skeptical about how the new strategy will achieve this ambitious target, especially since there is no implementation structure yet, coupled with the soaring costs of meters posing a major threat.