By Emameh Gabriel
Okpella, a community once brimming with life and promise, now finds itself suffocating under the weight of a modern day Dickensian nightmare, courtesy of the Bendel Electricity Distribution Company (BEDC). Like a fish out of water, the town gasps for breath, its vitality drained by the relentless exploitation and inefficiency of a company that seems to thrive on darkness. The BEDC, with its iron grip on Okpella’s power supply, has turned this industrious hub into a shadow of its former self, a community left helpless, choking on the fumes of exorbitant bills.
It is a tragic scene, one where the light at the end of the tunnel is not just dim but has been outright extinguished by the very hands meant to keep it burning. The BEDC, it seems, has taken it upon itself to turn Okpella into a cash cow, milking its residents dry while leaving them in perpetual gloom.
Imagine, if you will, a community that hosts two of the largest cement manufacturers in Africa, yet its residents are left groping in the dark like characters in a bad horror movie. The irony is as thick as the cement dust that hangs in the air. This is a community that in the real sense of it should be awash with the glow of progress, instead it has been reduced to a “dark house”, a term that would be comical if it weren’t so tragically accurate. The BEDC, in its infinite wisdom, has managed to turn a powerhouse of industry into a byword for inefficiency and exploitation.
Let’s talk about the bills, those fantastical pieces of paper that seem to have been plucked from the pages of a satirical novel. My aged parents sometimes last year, were slapped with a bill of over half a million naira. Half a million! For a household that uses little more than a few light bulbs and the occasional fan. One might wonder if the BEDC has a team of ghostwriters on its payroll, conjuring up these astronomical figures from the ether. Perhaps they have taken to billing the dead, my late brother who passed away two years ago. Maybe his ghost has been running up quite the electricity bill in the afterlife. Who knows? In the world of BEDC, anything is possible.
When confronted, the company’s response was as predictable as it was laughable: “It could be an oversight from the office.” An oversight? More like a calculated move to test the resolve of the peasants, as someone aptly put it. The BEDC seems to operate on the principle of “throw enough mud at the wall, and some of it will stick.” In this case, the mud is in the form of exorbitant bills, and the wall is the long suffering residents of Okpella.
Chief Kayode Olowu, a vocal critic of the BEDC, has been leading the charge against this injustice. His latest missive is a damning indictment of the company’s practices: “BEDC, in a full month, we are only getting light for four hours a day, seven days a month in Okpella. That’s not up to 12 hours for Band D. Yet you are billing every house 10,000 naira on estimated billing. Going from 3,000 to 10,000 naira. As of the time of this message, we have no light. Mr Regional Manager, are you aware? NERC, we are waiting for your complaint website.”
One can almost hear the collective groan of Okpella’s residents as they read this. Four hours of electricity a day? That is not even enough time to charge a phone, let alone power an industrial community. And yet, the BEDC has the audacity to charge 10,000 naira per household. It is like charging someone for a five course meal and serving them a single stale breadcrumb. The sheer gall of it is enough to make one’s head spin.
How did we get here? Okpella, a community that was once known for its regular power supply, has been almost entirely cut off from the grid. This is a community that generates power for neighbouring communities, yet it languishes in darkness. It is like a farmer who grows enough food to feed an entire village but is left to starve. The BEDC’s actions are not just inefficient; they are downright cruel.
The solution, however, is not beyond reach. Metering should begin immediately, and companies like BUA and Dangote, which have profited immensely from the community’s resources, should take direct responsibility for powering each home. After all, these companies donated a whopping 13 billion naira for the IBB Presidential library. Surely, they can spare a drop in the ocean to bring light to the community that has made their fortunes possible.
We are calling on those in authority, to look into BEDC activities in Okpella and the plight of the people. The people of Okpella are not asking for the moon, they are simply demanding what is rightfully theirs: reliable electricity and fair treatment. They are paying for power, yet what they receive is darkness, frustration, and exploitation. This is not just a failure of service; it is a moral question, a betrayal of the trust placed in those who are meant to serve the public good.
The BEDC’s actions or rather, inactions, are a glaring indictment of a system that has gone horribly awry. Estimated billing, exorbitant charges, and erratic power supply have become the hallmarks of their operations, leaving the people of Okpella to bear the brunt of this inefficiency.
It is your duty, as those in authority, to intervene. Investigate the affairs of the BEDC. Hold them accountable for their actions. Ensure that the people of Okpella, and indeed all communities under their jurisdiction, get value for their money. No one should pay for darkness. No one should be forced to fund their own suffering. This is not acceptable.
The people of Okpella are not just customers; they are citizens deserving of dignity and respect. They deserve to live in a community where the lights stay on, where their hard earned money is not squandered on phantom electricity, and where their voices are heard.
Our leaders, too, must wake up from their slumber and take concrete actions to improve the lives of their people. Power is life, and Okpella, an industrial community, cannot be left to live in darkness. The BEDC’s reign of terror must end, and the light of progress must be restored to Okpella. Until then, the residents of this beleaguered community will continue to live in the shadow of the BEDC’s cash cow carnival, where darkness reigns and exploitation is the order of the day.
BEDC’s antics can be likened to the case of Nigeria where the only thing more unreliable than the power supply is the promise to fix something. And so, the people of Okpella wait, their candles burning low, their patience wearing thinner than the wires that are supposed to bring them light. But their hope persists. One day, the lights will come on, and BEDC’s carnival of darkness will be but a distant memory. Until then, the show must go on, much to the dismay of Okpella’s long suffering residents.
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