Sokoto State Governor, Ahmad Aliyu, has urged the Kaduna Electricity Distribution Company to improve on its services for more payments from customers.

Mr Aliyu made the call at the Customers Complaints Resolution Meeting organised by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) on Thursday in Sokoto.

The governor, represented by the state Commissioner for Energy and Petroleum Resources, Sanusi Ibrahim, lamented that residents could not continue to pay for darkness instead of steady electricity supply.

”I urged you to improve the electricity supply to consumers before any hike in tariff. I really commended you for organising this kind of meeting; however, I need to remind you that you can only get more money from the people once your services improve. Both NERC and KAEDCO should concentrate on how best to improve services to get more money. When you improve on the service, patronage is sure,” Mr Aliyu said.

The governor told the meeting that some areas of the state had had no electricity in the last nine years, and KAEDCO had done nothing to correct it.

“The current administration has spent about N1.5 billion to replace some of the vandalised items in the state, which include transformers, poles, wires, among others. Only for KAEDCO to start collecting money from such customers when the process was completed. The company focuses more attention on how to obtain money, how to distribute more metres, but not on how to improve on the services being rendered to the people,” he lamented.

Mr Aliyu called on the management of KAEDCO to organise more of such an engagement to enable more consumers to be enlightened and know about their rights and why they should pay.

In his address, KAEDCO’s Chief Commercial Officer, Ahmed Sanusi, said the company was working to improve electricity supply in the state.

Mr Sanusi said the recent dip in the supply of electricity was as a result of a fire incident and vandalism in Kebbi State.

The event featured questions and answers from participants on the billing system, collection of money from customers for repairs, among others.

(NAN)