Electricity tariff hike for homes shelved till June

The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) will not increase tariff for residential buildings until June 2015, Sam Amadi, chairman of the commission has said.

Amadi made the explanation at a news conference in Abuja on Tuesday.

On December 23, 2014, the commission announced the review of the Multi Year Tariff Order (MYTO) 2.1 regime for commercial consumers, with effect from January 1.

But Amadi said that until June, the review was not expected to bring about any increase in tariff to residential customers on R2, who form 80 per cent of electricity consumers.

“Let me state upfront for the sake of clarity that NERC has not increased tariff for residential consumers for now,” he said.

“While the scheduled increase will apply to other classes of consumers from Jan. 1, it will not affect residential consumers until June 2015.”

Amadi said the decision to begin the implementation of the residential tariff in June was to balance the legitimate demand for adequate electricity supply with new charges.

“The freeze was designed to primarily protect and promote the interest of the consumers as well as stimulate operators to serve customers better,” he said.

He said it would be unfair for the commission to ask consumers to pay higher tariffs given the current level of service delivery and consumption perceptions.

Amadi said although electricity distribution companies were unhappy about the phased approach to increase in tariff, the commission had a responsibility to protect consumers.

He also expressed the commission’s dissatisfaction with the level of meter deployment by electricity distribution companies.

He said that NERC expected the companies to use the next six months to improve on their meter spread, adding that the commission was taking some regulatory measures to compel distribution companies to provided meters for consumers.