The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) yesterday announced new penalties for individuals and businesses found guilty of tampering with or bypassing electricity meters.
The revised Order on unauthorised access, meter tampering, and bypass, NERC said, replaces Order No: NERC/REG/41/2017, taking effect from January 22, 2025.
NERC said the new order aligned with the Electricity Act 2023 and the Customer Protection Regulations (CPR) 2023, meant to strengthen enforcement against electricity theft and ensure compliance with metering regulations.
“Customers who by-pass meters or gain unauthorised access must pay administrative charges (including meter replacement costs) and reconnection costs. Any customer that gains unauthorised access to electricity through tampering or meter bypass will be reconnected upon payment of the administrative charges including meter replacement cost,” NERC said.
It added that the order aims to reduce unauthorised access to electricity, meter tampering, and bypass as well as establish transparent reconnection guidelines to ensure compliance.
In the new regime, non-maximum demand, single-phase meters, who are first offenders will pay N100,000, while it will be N150,000 subsequently.
In the same vein, non-maximum three-phase meters who breach the order will pay N200,000 as first offenders and N300,000 subsequently. Also, maximum demand customers will pay 450 per cent of last recorded consumption, and 600 per cent subsequently.
Henceforth, reconnection cost for non-maximum demand will be N10,000 , while maximum demand customers will pay N50,000 for reconnection, the order added.
If Discos fail to reconnect a customer within 48 hours after payment, NERC stated that they must compensate with 100 per cent of daily energy consumption in energy credit.
“Customers guilty of unauthorised access must pay for the loss of revenue through back-billing at the prevailing tariff,” the NERC order added.
“The order aims to: Reduce unauthorised access to electricity, meter tampering, and bypass and establish transparent reconnection guidelines to ensure compliance,” NERC said.
Meanwhile, the Minister of Power, Chief Adebayo Adelabu, has again said that he has intervened in the power crisis that has thrown many parts of Nigeria’s premier health institutions, the University Teaching Hospital (UCH) into darkness for over 100 days.
In a meeting held with representatives of the University of Ibadan, the College of Medicine, UCH, Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company (IBEDC) and technical engineers from both sides, the minister, who was represented by Bolaji Tunji, the Special Adviser, Strategic Communications and Media Relations, said Adelabu directed IBEDC to restore power to the College of Medicine and the halls of residence within the teaching hospital premises that had continued to be in darkness after the earlier meeting.
On Monday, February 10, the minister had met with the management of UCH and IBEDC to resolve the crisis that had thrown the institution in darkness for 102 days.
The aftermath of that meeting led to restoration of power to the clinical services section of UCH, while IBEDC said it was awaiting further guidance from UCH management on the next steps in restoring power to additional sections of the hospital.
The minister’s directives, a statement from the ministry said, came in view of the inability of the UCH management and the college of medicine to resolve the payment modalities and separation of assets due to the interconnectivity of the two entities.
As part of Monday’s resolution, the clinical area will now be solely connected to a new transformer before the end of the week while another transformer would be installed to serve the College of Medicine.
The minister had noted that the crisis was a customer – vendor issue which had nothing to do with the federal government.
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