….revenue losses hit ₦800m monthly
The Jos Electricity Distribution Company (JEDC) has expressed concern over growing resistance to the metering of churches, mosques and grinding machine operators, warning that the situation is contributing significantly to huge revenue losses across its network.
Speaking on Saturday, the Head of Corporate Services, JEDC, Musa Abdullahi, said the opposition, which has gained traction on social media, was surprising and counter-productive.
“There is an issue on social media concerning the metering of churches, mosques as well as grinding machine operators. They are against the metering of their business centres,” Abdullahi said.
He noted that religious institutions should ordinarily support transparent billing, given the moral values they preach.
“The two religions preach against stealing or taking what doesn’t belong to you, but to worship God with your resources. It’s surprising that worship centres are against the device that can authenticate their actual electricity consumption,” he stated.
Abdullahi explained that JEDC operates as a utility company without discrimination in the classification of customers.
“JEDC is a utility company that sells electricity to our esteemed consumers. Market operators do not know worship areas; all are seen as electricity consumers,” he said.
According to him, churches and mosques fall under high-demand customers due to the heavy electrical load associated with worship activities.
“The worship centres are massive demand customers because of the load from such centres. It’s only fair for our Imams and Pastors to encourage the installation of prepaid meters. It will help in ascertaining the actual consumption of worship centres,” he added.
Abdullahi further revealed alarming figures showing the gap between energy received and revenue collected by the company.
“In August, we received 19.58 million kilowatt-hour quantum of energy. When converted, it is ₦1.57 billion at 70 percent billing efficiency after yanking off 30 percent,” he said.
He disclosed that despite the energy received, collections remained poor.
“In August, we collected ₦744 million; we lost over ₦800 million. In September, we received 20.22 million kilowatt-hour quantum of energy, converted to ₦1.67 billion, but we collected only ₦757 million — again, we lost ₦800 million,” Abdullahi stated.
The situation, he said, worsened in October.
“In October, we received 25.26 million kilowatt-hour quantum of energy, converted to ₦1.86 billion. We collected ₦694 million. You can see the decline. We can’t defend this,” he said.
Abdullahi stressed that prepaid metering remains the most effective tool for transparency, accountability and sustainability in electricity supply, urging all consumers, including religious and commercial operators to support the initiative.
