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Expect More Electricity Supply Next Month -Fashola

 Nigeria’s Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, has assured Nigerians that electricity supply to homes will improve from next month.

Mr. Fashola said this while delivering a lecture at the University of Lagos on Thursday.

In his lecture titled “Power sector reform In Nigeria: challenges and the way forward”, the former Lagos state governor said, “We are working round the clock to solve the (power supply) problem. We are going to get more power by August.

“How we get equipment, transformers, and all of the equipment needed within the next cycle of 60 to 90 days is critical so that we don’t lose all that energy that is coming from the raining season,” he added.

Commenting further, Mr. Fashola said “If you don’t pay for electricity, you have violated a law. But we are now trying to make that law stronger, and we are looking at how to include fines and to increase the consequences. We want to make it easier to comply than to violate.”

“There are different types of consumers and therefore they require different kinds of meters. Meters are calibrated differently for each distribution company. So, the meter that Ikeja disco has – if you move them from Ikeja disco, they must be recalibrated before you can use them. If you use the wrong meter, you’ll pay the wrong tariff,” he stated.

On the agitation to cancel the privatisation of the power sector, Mr, Fashola said, “Instead of saying ‘cancel the privatisation,’ I would rather say, let us rework the privatisation and re-engineer it to make it work.

“When people ask us to cancel the privatisation, I ask them how that impacts our moving forward when we demonstrate that we are a nation that cancels a respecting contract. Where are we going to get the dollars to refund (the contractors)? Because they paid in dollars and I don’t think they would accept naira.”

The minister assured that the government would ensure that it makes the system work, adding that cancellation is not the best step to take.

“We cannot keep canceling, there must be a point where we can make things work and I guess that is what this administration is about. We can make it work,” he said.

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