The Port Harcourt Electricity Distribution PLC (PHED) has uncovered energy theft involving one of its clients, De Choice Shopping Mall in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State.
The value of the energy stolen, according to the MD/CEO of the DisCo, Dr. Henry Ajagbawa, is over N25 million.
Ajagbawa decried the massive theft describing it as “unprecedented.”
Ajagbawa lamented that PHED loses millions of naira monthly to energy theft, meter bypass and vandalism across its franchise area.
He said the development has adversely affected PHED’s collection efficiency and put a spanner in the works for the business.
He warned that anyone found to be engaging in meter by-pass will be prosecuted in line with extant state and federal laws, particularly under Section 400 of the Criminal Code Act and Section 1 (9 and 10) of the Miscellaneous Offences Act.
It was gathered that prior to the discovery, different technical teams from PHED had visited the customer on many occasions to check the integrity of its meter installation.
The DisCo staff were alleged to have been denied access to the premises.
However, on December 15, 2021, the PHED team, assisted by law enforcement agents, succeeded in accessing the premises and carried out a thorough investigation on the meter.
The investigation revealed that the customer had bypassed its installed meter and connected the bulk of its energy load directly to the pole which resulted in non-capturing of the entire energy consumption by the meter installed.
Upon further assessment to determine the cause of the load imbalance, it was discovered that besides the central change-over panel, De Choice Shopping Mall had allegedly installed another change-over panel where the bulk of energy was diverted from the meter.
To further give credence to the discovery, PHED team switched off the central change over and discovered that a section of the mall had no electricity supply while the other part was still powered and the energy was not recorded by the meter installed on the premises.
When Newsgazette called De Choice to react to the allegation, a customer care officer who identified himself as Itohowo gave the phone to a man who refused to disclose his identity to react to the issue. However, he said the company was not involved in any energy theft.
“We don’t have any issue like that,” he stated.
