The Benin Electricity Distribution Company (BEDC) is planning to relocate its head office from Benin City, capital of Edo State, THISDAY has learnt.
Sources confided in this newspaper that the planned relocation was triggered by the increased hostilities faced by the company from its host community, which was disclosed to the Edo House of Assembly yesterday.
Hinting that the power supply load shedding in Benin City may fall further if the power firm goes ahead with its plan, the source disclosed that out of a total of the low 1,271 Mega Watt (MW) power generation nationwide yesterday, the BEDC as one of the 11 Discos had an allocation of 109 MW .
“Out of this 109 MW, the host Edo State received 50 MW, while the remaining 59 MW are shared among the three other states – Ondo, Ekiti, and Delta.
Further investigation revealed that the Disco may be forced to balance better the power among all the states covered by BEDC if its head office is relocated from Benin, the source said; “What this means is that the Mega Watt supply in other states would improve and the excess given to Benin would also reduce. The company will equate the supply balancing if this is done.”
(BEDC) had earlier lamented the harassment of its staff by major stakeholders including youths and civil society in Edo State over a disagreement with its officials and security agents attached to the company. One of its business locations in Auchi was recently attacked and destroyed and is currently shut down with no power supplied to the area, due to non payment of bills.
The crisis started after some over 600 youths from the community, stormed the Auchi Business Unit and Urban Service Unit giving reason of not enough power supply allegedly stormed the office of BEDC Auchi Business District and Urban Service unit respectively, requesting for an immediate restoration of electricity supply to the community.
It took the intervention of the State Commissioner of Police of Edo State and the Army for peace to be restored between the community and BEDC,” the company had said in a statement.
“ In some other development earlier, the police had charged two youths to court over the alleged attacks on its men and the staff of BEDC.
