The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC, has disclosed that electricity subsidies payable by the Federal Government for the month of December has increased by 2.76 percent to N199.64 billion from N194.26 billion incurred in November.
The Commission in its December 2024 Multi-Year Tariff Order, MYTO, posted on its website retained electricity tariff across all customer categories.
While Band-A customers continued to pay N209/kWh, allowed tariffs for customers in Bands B to E remain frozen at the rate payable from December 2022.
With the policy, the Federal Government is expected to pay N29.10 billion (up from N27.86 in November) as subsidies for consumers under Abuja DisCo, while consumers under Ikeja Electric would enjoy electricity subsidies of N26.68 billion from the government.
NERC explained that the rise in exchange rate which it pegged at N1,687.45 to the dollar, increase in inflation to 33.9 percent, and changes in available generation capacity necessitated the minor review.
On wholesale gas-to-power prices, NERC stated: “The review maintains the benchmark gas-to-power price of $2.42/MMBTU based on the established benchmark price of gas-to-power by the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority, NMDPRA”.
The Commission maintained that the “approved tariffs shall remain in force subject to monthly adjustment of pass-through indices including inflation rate, NGN/dollar exchange rate and gas-to-power prices”.
Speaking to Vanguard on the subsidies, Executive Director, Electricity Consumers Protection Centre, Chief Princewill Okorie, said subsidies without adequate supply was meaningless.
According to him, “the government cannot continue to fund the DisCos while they fail to provide the services they are required to provide. Power supply has been abysmal and consumers continued to be billed for electricity they did not consume through estimated billing by the DisCos”.
