Population growth leading to increase in consumer base has increased the number of unmetered power users in Nigeria by two million, the Federal Government has said.
The government also disclosed it had provided about one million meters for electricity consumers in the past 10 months under its National Mass Metering Programme.
The Special Assistant to the President on Infrastructure, Ahmed Zakari, disclosed this during a live television interview session monitored in Abuja on Friday.
He noted that before the advent of the NMMP there had never been a fully funded national metering programme since the sector was privatised in 2013.
“What that means is that from 2013 to 2020 we allowed the customer and population growth to increase without any stable or clear plan to solve metering, which is the primary basis for the economic viability of the sector,” Zakari said.
He stated that the government had to overhaul the entire metering infrastructure of the country through the NMMP.
He said, “Prior to the mass metering programme, a maximum of only 200,000 meters had ever been rolled out in one year in Nigeria since privatisation.
“But with the NMMP, in 10 months we’ve rolled out a million meters by increasing the capacity of the market to absorb meters by a multiple of five.”
Zakari said the government was working to close the metering gap before the end of the current administration, adding that guidelines for the execution of the metering project had been set.
He said the Central Bank of Nigeria and other financial institutions were providing the required funding for the programme.
The presidential aide further stated that at the commencement of the NMMP, the metering gap in Nigeria was about six million.
“One million meters were deployed through phase zero, four million will be deployed through phase one and then we have another programme of the World Bank that we are working on which will cover another one million. Everything is under the NNMP guideline,” Zakari stated.
Asked about the current number of unmetered power users, he said, “I think with additional enumeration, perhaps there might be an additional two million customers who have come into the landscape. And that number may continue to evolve. But the six million target was the 100 per cent of the gap when the NMMP started. This can be closed within the life of the administration
