Power Sector: NERC, FCCPC Signs MoU To Enhance Efficient Service Delivery, Consumer Satisfaction

The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) on Thursday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) to reinforce its commitment towards ensuring that consumers of power sector services receive values worth their money.

The Chairman of the NERC, Sanusi Garba, recalled at the MoU signing that although both NERC and FCCPC have collaborating in the past to ensure consumers satisfaction, added that the MoU is further formalization of what both parties had been doing and to ensure perfection.

According to the NERC Chairman, “Clearly, our collaboration started when we’re having these challenges in terms of patent reform, and also consumer protection. But seeing the critical importance of hiring in moving the power industry to where it should be at the same time also looking at the consumer side.

“I recall we did a lot of work within our boardrooms and so on. And your team also supported the commission in creation of content and so on.”

Garba noted that regulating the power sector and ensuring consumer protection is not an easy one due to accumulated inherited legacy problems which the Commission is committed to resolving.

“Now, the issue of consumer protection in the power sector is something that I want to say that nobody in charge of either regulating the electricity industry or regulating the consumer protection, can be in a comfortable position, because arising from the infrastructure deficits and also the challenges of Metering gap that we have inherited over time, and probably to some extent, the legacy of malaise in a public ownership in the old utilities in the country. We have a challenge of making sure that consumers actually get service and so on”, the NERC Chairman stated.

He enumerated that the most prevalent complaints in the electricity sector now include issues of meter, estimated billing, lack of service, completely out of service, inadequate service, inadequacies and so on.

However, he assured that with the signing of the MoU, concrete steps would be taken towards resolving them.

He said: “All this can be tied to the legacy issues that the industry has been battling with, and also what the reform agenda was intended to address. So the work is not done yet. And I think the MOU we’re assigning today is a very important step, whereby two government agencies charged with regulating different aspects of the same Nigerian nation are coming together to collaborate in terms of synergy, pulling our resources together.”

On his part, the Executive Vice Chairman/CEO of PCCPC, Babatunde Irukera, emphasized the commitment of both parties to ensure improved service delivery and consumers satisfaction.

He noted that both parties had long history of collaboration and assured that the MoU would further strengthen the understanding and collaboration towards achieving efficiency in service delivery and consumers get values for the money.