Authorities in Nigeria have said there are no plans in place to significantly increase the electricity tariff.
The country’s minister of power, Sale Mamman said the latest review is just a routine procedure and not a major increase.
The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) had on Monday announced plans to introduce another tariff review increase for the 11 distribution companies (DisCos) in the country, starting from July.
But in a statement in Abuja, the Nigerian capital, Mr Mamman said Nigerians should expect an increase in efficiency from the sector to reduce tariffs.
“The tariff for customers on service bands D & E (customers being served less than an average of 12hrs of supply per day over a period of one month) remains subsidized in line with the policy direction of the Federal Government,” Mamman said in the statement made available to journalists.
“The Multi-Year Tariff Order (MYTO) per NERCs regulation obtains inputs from operators in the market every 6 months to perform minor reviews and a major review is required every 5 years. Thus, as in January a minor review will occur in June. Given the timing for the Extraordinary review has also elapsed, a review will occur for consideration in Jan 2021.”
According to the minister the Nigerian government is committed to putting an end to metering gap with the National Mass Metering Programme (NMMP).
By Abel Ejikeme