Our Post-paid Customers Owe N115bn—JED Cries Out

By Adedapo Adesanya

The Jos Electricity Distribution Company (JED) has said that post-paid customers across its franchise states are indebted to the company to the tune of N115 billion.

This was disclosed by the Managing Director of the company, Mr Hashim Bakori, who explained that the debt owed was different from the cost of energy losses as a result of energy theft.

He said this was discovered after 16 months of hard work after resuming office with his team as the new management of JED.

Mr Bakori disclosed this in Jos during the launch of the company’s 5-years Corporate Strategic Plan to kick start a new goal to be achieved by the organisation.

‘If nothing is done to bridge the gap, a lot will go wrong and that is why we are launching the Corporate Strategic Plan and by the time we are done, people will start seeing the improvement of energy supply across our franchise states.

“We have consulted reputable companies in the world to come and partner with us in moving the company forward.

“From today, you will see a very new Jos DisCo,” he said.

Mr Bakori, however, pointed out that despite the several efforts put in by the new management of JED, vandals and energy thieves still remain a challenge to the company.

“Despite these efforts, the company is currently bedevilled by some man-made challenges. These challenges range from vandalism and theft of our installations, energy theft to customers huge indebtedness to the company.

“In 2021 alone, vandals and thieves have torched about 200 distribution transformers, armoured cables, copper earth wires, transformer oil, feeder pillar copper bars, several spans of aluminium conductors, line insulators etc,” he said.

Headquartered in Jos, Plateau State, the company operates one of the longest distribution networks in the country. It caters to over 400,000 customers in the franchise regions of Plateau, Gombe, Bauchi and Benue States.