Eleven months after the meter asset provider regulation was inaugurated to expedite deployment of prepaid meters, Nigerians are yet to feel the impact of the scheme

By Anayo Ezugwu

BARELY one year after the inauguration of the Meter Asset Provider, MAP, regulation by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC, electricity consumers are yet to feel the impact of the scheme. The scheme was meant to expedite the deployment of prepaid meters to end estimated billing by power distribution companies.

The MAP regulation launched in March 2018, introduced a new set of service providers in the power sector called meter asset providers. The programme was designed to fast-track the roll-out of meters through the engagement of third-party investors for the financing, procurement, supply, installation and maintenance of electricity meters.

The Discos were required to commence the procurement process of engaging meter asset providers to serve their service areas in accordance with an approved roll-out plan. With the regulation becoming effective on April 3, 2018, the Discos were expected to within 120 days from the effective date engage the services of MAPs towards the achievement of their three-year metering targets prescribed by NERC.

But 11 months after its introduction, the impact of the metering initiative has not yet been felt by consumers as the process of procuring MAPs has not been concluded by the Discos. Babatunde Fashola, minister of power, works and housing, has attributed the inability of the Discos to provide meters to financial constraints.

However, he promised that the MAP scheme would ease the financial pressure facing Discos as new investors would come into the metering space. According to him, the NERC has screened 108 meter providers that are now undergoing the process of certification.

At the inauguration of the Nigerian Electricity Management Services Agency, NEMSA, upgraded and remodeled chemical and engineering laboratory at Ijora-Olopa, Lagos, Fashola, said: “We have a policy on metering, which is the meter asset provider, MAP, policy, which allows new businesses to enter the metering area. Just the way generation and distribution companies were licensed; we will license them as MAPs in the value chain of power supply.

“This will relieve the pressure on the finances of Discos to supply meters, but it does not discharge the Discos of the contractual obligation that they have to do but we know they (Discos) are challenged by financing. “We think we can open this business up for new operators to come in. At this moment 108 companies have applied and are going through the process of being certified by the NERC, among others.

“The policy is now playing out and the distance and transition between policy and impact you will see as we go on as supply of meters begin to trickle down. When those companies begin to operate they will employ a lot of people – fitters, technicians, installers and those into wiring will be trained. Many of them have been trained by our training institute, National Power Training Institute of Nigeria, NAPTIN.

“Nigerians will see economic renaissance in the electricity sub-sector when MAPs come into operation just like what happened in the retail telecoms sector–telephone sales, repair and vending, among others,” he said.

According to the MAP regulation, the Discos and the MAPs shall enter into a metering service agreement, which shall provide for the number of meters to be installed in the distribution licensee’s network over an agreed period and the recovery of the cost of meter asset plus a reasonable return over a period of 10 years, among others.

Chijioke James, president, Electricity Consumers Association of Nigeria, said the delay in the procurement of MAPs automatically has continued to foist hardship on the consumers. “I think the delay may be intentional. Maybe some people within the Discos are sabotaging the MAP scheme, because I see no reason why you want to collect your money and the instrument that you need to collect the money is lacking.

“If you say you are a distribution company, your primary tool of operation is the meter. How can you distribute and you are finding it difficult to invest in what you will use to collect revenue to defray your costs? The system is such that the consumers are at the receiving end; that is our challenge,” he said.

NERC, in its fourth quarter report released in January, stated that the metering gap for customers still remained a key challenge facing the Nigerian electricity supply industry. It said out of the 8,310,408 registered electricity customers, only 3,704,302 (about 45 percent) had been metered as of the end of the third quarter of 2018. “The majority of customers (55 per cent) are still on estimated billing, thus contributing to customer apathy towards payment for electricity,” it said.

The commission said it had intensified its monitoring of Discos’ implementation of and compliance with the provisions of the MAP regulation in order to fast-track meter roll-out and close the metering gap within three years.

“NERC is not doing enough as the regulator. We have a situation where the consumers hardly get justice. If NERC is serious about protecting the consumers and has put in place a guideline regarding when consumers must be metered, the Discos should be sanctioned if they fail to comply with that guideline,” James said.

On January 22, a bill seeking to amend the Electric Power Sector Reform Act, prohibit and criminalise estimated billing passed the third reading at the House of Representatives. The House will transmit the bill to the Senate for agreement. If the upper chamber passes the bill, it will be transmitted to the President to give his assent to it and end the unjust and exorbitant estimated billing that consumers are made to bear.

– Feb. 1, 2019 @ 15:59 GMT |