Electricity bill payment of Nigerians hits 8-year-high of N757bn, as govt removes subsidy

A new report has revealed that the amount of money paid for electricity hit an eight-year high in 2021.

The report which was Association of Nigerian Electricity Distributors (ANED) the umbrella body for the electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos) shows that a total of N757 billion was collected from Nigerians for electricity consumed in 2021.

This is 46 percent increase from N516 billion paid in 2020 and the highest amount since 2013 when the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) was unbundled.

The report which was obtained from the website of the association also showed an increase in the number of metered Nigerians to 10.01 million from 9.95 million in 2020.

However it was not all good news as the DisCos reported that they incurred new N343 billion additional debt from end customers in 2021.

Read also: Nigerian govt confirms removal of subsidy on electricity tariff

But when compared to power firms revenue ANED were happy nothing that the revenue increase was largely due to subsidy removal and increase in tariff.

Part of the report reads “The daily energy sent-out by the GenCos and wheeled by TCN in 2021 was on average 99,186 MWh (4,133 MW), which is about only 4.9% increase from 2020 (3,984 MW) and very insufficient to cover the huge unsuppressed demand in Nigeria”.

However, “DisCos have benefitted from the tariff increases since November 2020 and have even improved the collection efficiency from an average of 67 percent to 69 percent in 2021.”

“The removal of the subsidy after the Extraordinary Tariff Review in November 2020, which resulted in an increase of the Allowed Tariff, has driven new records in revenues and collections.”

A breakdown of the DisCos’ financials indicates that in Q1, the DisCos invoiced their consumers N278 billion but only received N181 billion in 2021, resulting in a N97 billion loss.

The power bill was N275 billion in Q2 2021, but only N183 billion was collected.

The electrical bill in Q3 and Q4 were N261 billion and N287 billion, respectively, but only N190 billion and N203 billion were collected.

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