BEDC frustrating our efforts to ensure power supply -Delta govt.

By Nosa Akenzua, Asaba

Delta State Government on Thursday said that the Benin Electricity Distribution Company ( BEDC) was frustrating its efforts on power sector development in the state.
The state Commissioner for Energy, Barr Basil Ganagana who made this known to journalists in Asaba decried the attitude of the management of BEDC towards ensuring power supply to Deltans in the recent times.
“The State Government does not generate and supply electricity but provides Infrastructural and enabling environment for sustainable electrification of communities, and the sole responsibility of BEDC and Distribution Companies ( DISCOS) to generate and supply electricity to the people,” he said The commissioner opined that within the past few weeks he assumed office, the Delta State Government has invested a huge sums of money in the power sector, adding that it had also provided transformers and lots more equipment for effective electrification of various communities, regretting that BEDC on its part had abysmally failed to live up to the expectations of the people.
Noting that BEDC had allegedly failed to switch on some of the communities in the state where transformers were provided, the commissioner said that Mosogar community for instance, was provided with a transformer of 2.5MVA to replace the burnt one BEDC installed earlier, but failed to carry out its responsibility for no reason adduced.
“We as a government have been doing our best but BEDC has failed us and failed to complement the efforts of the state at making sure that the people of Delta State enjoy power supply, and If government provides transformers, BEDC will not power it for use and the officers will be going about collecting money from the consumers, BEDC had failed to supply the people with meters yet it sends estimated bills and refused to power the transformers provided by government”, the Commissioner said.
He, however, expressed interest of the state government to continue to attend to the needs of the people and warned that the state government would not tolerate it’s efforts being sabotaged by BEDC.