Adedapo Adesanya
By Adedapo Adesanya
The federal government will begin a fresh round of prepaid meter distribution in the first quarter of 2022 to four million Nigerian households.
Tagged Phase 1 of the metering plan, the meters will be sourced from local manufacturers who have already started bidding for the contract compared with the previous phase where the meters were imported.
The previous phase dubbed Phase 0 of the mass metering exercise began in 2020 and had targeted one million households.
It was revealed that funds for the new batch of meters are being provided by the federal government and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
The World Bank has also pledged to support the project with additional meters to close the wide metering gap in the country.
The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) had introduced the Credit Advance Payment for Metering Implementation (CAPMI) after the 2013 privatisation exercise as a way of closing the metering gap in the power sector.
The scheme, however, failed as most consumers who paid did not get metered due to funds being trapped in an escrow account.
As a result, the Meter Asset Providers (MAPs) was introduced following CAPMI’s failure to meet the target.
And just like CAPMI with its many challenges, the MAPs’ meter rollout was slow-paced due to lack of funding, prompting an intervention by the federal government with the National Mass Metering Programme (NMMP), still with little or no changes.
The 11 electricity distribution companies were able to distribute just a little over 200,000 meters under the MAPs in the just concluded phase.
However, while electricity consumers who can wait for the federal government free meters under the NMMP are at will to do so, those who cannot, are permitted to apply for metres under the DisCos MAPs.
Business Post understands that consumers will get a refund with electricity units from the respective DisCos in charge of their area.
