By CHARLES LWUOHA

No fewer than 4,200 electricity customers of Enugu Electricity Distribution PLC (EEDC) residing in Iyiowa and Odekpe areas of Anambra State have been subjected to darkness and untold hardship for over 18 days.

This is as a result of 2nd Niger Bridge construction activities of Julius Berger PLC, along Atani road, which affected the underground cable powering EEDC’s Iyiowa 11KV feeder.

As a result of this development which happened since February 7, 2020, the Iyiowa 11KV feeder has been out of supply due to the underground cables that were punctured in many sections by the heavy equipment belonging to Julius Berger.

This development was made known to newsmen by the Head of Communications, EEDC, Mr. Emeka Ezeh, on Wednesday.

According to Ezeh, the construction company embarked on excavation of the cable corridor without notifying EEDC to assist by granting outage or possibly deploying its cable locator equipment, to properly identify the location of the cable.

He said: “Usually, before such a project is embarked on, the contractor is expected to engage EEDC to ensure safety precautionary measures are in place and to also provide technical assistance by assigning its staff familiar with the network, to ensure proper management of the electrical asset during excavation.

“This negligence by Julius Berger resulted to damaged and punctured EEDC cables by their heavy equipment.

“We have had other incidents in the recent past where their team or sub-contractors worked in areas within our cable corridor at the location without recourse to our organization, and also damaged our cables and assets.”

It was gathered that EEDC has officially written to the Management of Julius Berger PLC on this development, through its Commercial Manager, Bridge Head Yard, Ogbaru, but still awaiting their response.

“This forced outage has significantly resulted to high loss of revenue to our organisation, equally disrupted commercial activities and subjected our customers to avoidable inconveniences,” Ezeh said.

We therefore use this medium to appeal for the understanding of our esteemed customers affected by this situation, while we continue to follow up with Julius Berger for a lasting solution to this issue.

EEDC sincerely apologised for the discomfort this situation must have caused her esteemed customers.

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