The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) said that it will invest heavily in technology to improve consumer service delivery.
NERC’s Chairman, Sanusi Garba stated this on Monday during a session with the House of Representatives Finance Committee on the 2023-2025 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework and Fiscal Strategy Paper (MTEF/FSP).
According to Garba, information technology is critical in utility regulation because it is not appropriate to rely solely on information provided by licensees.
“So we are investing heavily in technology so we have credible information about quality of service.
“Without technology, we can not know that a feeder in an area is out for 48 hours and people are in darkness,” Garba said.
Garba added that NERC “would want to be in a position to see what is happening in all the feeders directly from the commission, not relying on the DISCOS telling you we supplied this and that in so, so location”.
“So, investing ₦5 billion on technology today is nothing,” he said.
Garba also stated that the commission had hired auditors to audit its accounts for the fiscal year 2021, which is expected to be completed in October.
NERC’s Revenue Projection for 2023 to 2025
While speaking on the revenue projections from 2023 to 2025, he disclosed that “in 2024, revenues will go up slightly to ₦23.5 billion and the operating surplus will go down to ₦1.1 billion and the reason is simply that we are motivated as much as we can to reduce the tariff burden of consumers because of affordability issues”.
“In 2025, revenues go up to ₦24.7 and the operating surplus goes up to ₦1.4 billion. I repeat the surpluses are going down because we want to reduce the tariff burden of consumers.
“Right now, the federal government is subsidising the tariff to some extent. In the last few years, subsidies were in the region of ₦5 billion.
“So, we don’t want to contribute additional burdens and that’s why the surpluses are declining as we go forward,” he said.
