Following the recent increment in electricity tariff, the Coalition for Affordable and Regular Electricity (CARE) has expressed the need to re-nationalise the power sector, saying poor citizens would eventually pay for the hiked Band A tariffs by paying new costs for products and services that will be imposed on them by the rich.
According to the body, if the power sector is brought under public ownership, it will be subjected to democratic control and management of the working masses with the view to ushering in public investment that will drive the cost of electricity down and make it affordable in the long run for most Nigerian consumers.
Recall that the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) hiked the electricity tariff for Band A consumers by 230 per cent from N68 Kwh to N225 Kwh.
According to NERC, the hike, which affects about 15 per cent of total consumers is targeted at rich people.
But the group, through its National Coordinator, Chinedu Bosah, lamented that the increment, which had affected many big companies would translate to higher cost of production or business and be passed on to workers and the poor as higher prices of goods and services.
It said the current cost of living crises would be further aggravated, throwing more working people into poverty.
“The implication is that the outrageous tariff hike announced for Band A consumers is to test the waters and more hikes await consumers on other bands until the so-called cost-reflective pricing is achieved. As long as the naira is weak, basic infrastructure is either absent or in a terrible state, lack of investment in critical sectors, characteristic greed and drive for super profit means that power companies in connivance with the capitalist government will continuously increase electricity tariff after phasing out the so-called subsidy.
“Besides, the agenda is also to create an apartheid-styled electricity distribution system entrenched in massive exploitation. This means communities dominated by the middle class and the rich get 20 hours or more electricity daily while communities dominated by workers and the poor get little or no electricity daily.
In this type of unfair, discriminative electricity supply, Band A which constitutes about 15 per cent, may get about 50 per cent or more of the electricity supply, while 85 per cent of the other consumers may get less than 50 per cent of the electricity supplied. The power sector was built and funded by Nigerian taxpayers, which include Nigerian workers and the poor, but it is a case of robbing Peter (the workers) to pay Paul (the rich). Every Nigerian deserves equal, affordable and uninterrupted power supply irrespective of social status.
The government can tax the rich progressively more than the workers but social amenities like education, healthcare, electricity etc., must be distributed equally to all,” CARE stated.
