other consumer rights

Where the above complaint is made to the appropriate electricity distribution company in charge of the premises, the company is expected to send an authorized Officer to visit the premises of the customer and where appropriate, test the meter to determine its accuracy. All this must be done within 3 working days upon receipt of the customer’s complaint. However, if no official reply can be given at the time of the visit, then such reply must be made within 5 days of the visit Note that an electricity company will not be bound by the above if it thinks it necessary to install a check meter on the premises and proceed to inform the customer that reply shall be given as soon as sufficient data is gathered.

Regulation 6 Customer Service Standards of Performance for Distribution Companies 2007

No, it is not right. Where a distribution company intends to undertake maintenance to its equipment, such company must as a matter of fact issue a three(3) working days’ notice to its customers informing them of a possible interruption of power supply before it can effectively carryout any discontinuance of power supply as result of equipment maintenance.

Regulation 4 Customer Service Standards of Performance for Distribution Companies 2007.

The electricity distribution company is bound to act upon receipt of a report that the electricity it supplied to a premises is either too high or too low as against the normal limit of the voltage prescribed. In fact an authorized officer of the company is expected to visit the customer’s premises within twenty four (24) hours of the problems being reported and where an official response cannot be given at the time of the visit, then response must be provided within another 24 hours from the time of the visit.

Regulation 5 Customer Service Standards of Performance for Distribution Companies 2007.

No, it is not exactly so. Every law relating to and providing for anything to be done in the area of electricity generation, transmission and distribution, are all subject to the CFRN, 1999. The Constitution in Section 44 provides that no citizen’s land can be taken away from him by anybody, including Governments at all levels, without doing so under due process of the law as regards Notice, Assessment of the value and monetary worth developments and improvements thereon, payment of Compensation, etc. Etc.

The provisions of the Land Use Act in Sections 28, 29 and 44 ordinarily afford the citizen good enough protection against arbitrary and unlawful loss of his land to anybody, including the governments.

Problems do frequently occur when the governments that are supposed to protect the people become the expropriators of the citizens’ land for businesses in which, most of the time, officials have hidden interests in.

At the beginning of answering this question we guardedly said “…it is not exactly so”. That is because while there are Constitutional and statutory safeguards, those will not stop the land from being taken from the citizen even where he would have said that he will not give up his land at any cost, he is forced by the same Constitution and Statutes to give it up on the terms set by the Constitution and the Statutes, not his own terms, but on the terms of those legal provisions that are not totally dictated by market forces. For instance, when calculating the compensation that would be paid a land owner for his land, no value is attached to the land itself as it is ‘owned’ by the Governor in trust for the people of the State. Only un-harvested crops, economic trees and unexhausted developments in the land are assessed.

So, the question is not whether the citizen’s land can be taken from him for the business operation of an electric power sector Licensee, it can always be so taken. But it must be STRICTLY according to the provisions of the law.

Fortunately for the citizens, the Courts of our land have, for those citizens who have the wherewithal to pursue their cases to the end of the judicial road, not spared the hammer upon the heads of the many land thieves in our land. See just but a few of the bold decisions of the Supreme Court of Nigeria in these cases: Ibrahhim V. Mohammed (2003) 6 NWLR (Pt. 917) 615; Nigerian Engineering Works Ltd. V. Denap Ltd. (1997) 10 NWLR (Pt. 525) 481; Goldmark (Nig.) Ltd. V. Ibafon Co. Ltd. (2012) 10 NWLR (Pt. 1308) 291; Orianzi V. A. G. Rivers State (2017) LPELR – 41737

Several resource-based and environmental safety rights of the citizens enshrined in the Constitution of Nigeria unlawfully do get trampled upon in the quest to acquire land for electricity facilities. Foremost amongst these are the citizens’ right to own land, freedom of movement and right to healthy life itself.

Electricity installations are most times cordoned and fenced off to prevent people from having access into such places (Section 41 of the CFRN, 1999, as amended), most times quite justifiable as a way of protecting them, yes, but still, their lives are intruded upon as their movements are so restricted. The provision in Section 43 of CFRN, 1999 about the right of the citizen to acquire and own immovable property (Land) is the most vulnerable to the electrification business in Nigeria, because the protection afforded by the strict provisions in Section 44 of CFRN, 1999 is most of the time, especially with the arm-twisting involvement of the State Governments, observed in breach.

There exists large room of improvement in enforcing regulations that dictate safe distance between human residential and business places and certain electricity installations out of which radiations of dangerous electrons can pose dangers to citizens. On this, one cannot but regret that by the EXCEMPTION CLAUSE of Section 6((6)(c) of the CFRN, 1999, Section 20 of the CFRN, 1999 (The State shall protect and improve the environment and safeguard the water, air and land, forest and wild life of Nigeria) and other third generation fundamental rights of the citizens are not enforceable. See also the decision of the Supreme Court decisions in OKOJIE V. LAGOS STATE GOVERNMENT (1981) 2 NCLR 337, and A. G. OF ONDO STATE V. A. G. FEDERATION (2002) 9 NWLR (Pt. 722) 222 It is always easy for the governments in Nigeria to particularly stand on Fundamental Economic Objectives provisions of Section 16 of the CFRN, 1999, especially subs (a) and (b), not minding other equally important related sections and subsections of the Constitution.

Of course, those window-dressing rights in Sections 13 – 21 are not justiceable and so, unenforceable as far as the citizens are concerned.