Electricity distribution companies (DiSCos) have defended the hike in electricity tariff, saying Band A customers in the country enjoy the lowest price in West Africa.

“Even the band A customers who are currently paying the highest in Nigeria, they pay the lowest tariff in the whole of West Africa,” the spokesman of the country’s 11 electricity distribution companies under the umbrella of the Association of Nigerian Electricity Distributors (ANED) Sunday Oduntan said on Thursday’s edition of Channels Television’s Lunchtime Politics.

The ANED spokesman who doubled down on his stance, said electricity consumers in neigbhouring countries like the Benin Republic, Mali, Burkina Faso, and Ghana enjoy better output because they “pay for it.”

“That is why the people supplying are able to recover their cost,” he said, arguing that the power sector needs funds to invest and improve electricity subsidy.

“That is why they are able to get enough capital to reinject into the system. So, it is very simple.”

The hike in electricity tariff made headlines earlier in the year when the government said it would stop subsidising power for some customers.

Customers who enjoyed at least 20 hours of daily power supply were categorised into Band A users. While they initially paid N225/kwh, it was reviewed to be about N209.80/kwh.

While the move sparked a backlash from Nigerians, the Federal Government insisted that subsidy on electricity is unsustainable.

“And the journey starts now. That we should do a gradual migration from the subsidy regime to a full cost-reflective regime and we must start with some customers,” the Minister of Power Adebayo Adelabu.

“Whatever consumers pay for, there must be commensurate value for it,” he said, a similar sentiment shared by the ANED spokesman.

“The people in Band A pay more than others because they pay the true cost of electricity in Nigeria which is talking about the cost of production – the landing cost of electricity – cost without subsidy; they are the ones paying without the government subsidizing them,” he said on the show.

“All others, like Band B, are being subsidised by the government for as much as 67 per cent. So, what you pay is not what you are supposed to be paying.” (Channels TV)

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