Residents and Indigenes of Umuawulu community in Awka South local government Area of Anambra state have threatened to occupy Enugu Electricity Distribution Company EEDC, Awka office, if it fails to restore power to community within two weeks.
The threat was contained in a protest letter titled ” Protest Against Continued Breach of NERC Decision on Restoration of Light to Health Centre Substation Transformer ,Umuawulu” to EEDC by the community.
The letter was jointly signed by Chairman, Comrade Osita Obi ,Secretary, Cyril C Eziofor, Legal Adviser, Bar. Tony Anazor, and copied to the Anambra State Commissioner of Police and Director, Department of State Security (DSS) .
The community however, accused the power company of breach of contract and disregard to the Nigeria Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC directive on restoration of light.
According to the statement, “The EEDC has continuously breached directive from Nigeria Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC for metering and restoration of light after clearing outstanding bills.
“The consumers of Health Center Substation Transformer Umuawulu have since cleared the outstanding bills of N7,204,000 as far back as 30th December, 2022 and individual consumers have been captured in EEDC DATA BASE, account numbers have been assigned to them and Demand Notice issued and many have paid for prepaid meters
“It is regrettable that only a few meters have been installed without energizing the transformer.
“To make the situation more hopeless, many consumers cannot pay for their meters because the remita payment reference was deactivated without directives on how else to make payments.
“The only health institution in Umuawulu community has been in darkness for three years. AIl efforts to get officials of your organization at Awka to do the needful have proved abortive as they are unwilling to cooperate.
“We therefore demand that you take immediate steps to the following consumers: Restore light to the Health Center Substation Transformer Umuawulu without further delay.
Take note that if after two weeks from today nothing is done in this regard, we shall have no other option than to mobilize over 2000 electricity consumers to occupy EEDC Office until we receive justice” it stated.