Residents of Ado-Ekiti, capital of Ekiti Sate, have expressed worried over what they described as large numbers of faulty and vandalised transformers which littered major streets in the town.
The resident also expressed concern over what they described as the attitude of the officials of the Benin Electricity Distribution Company (BEDC) towards the plights of the people of the area..
Some of the affected areas were the palace of Ewi, Oba Rufus Adeyema Adejugbe, Post Office, Okesa Ogbonado, Ogbon Oba, Oja Oba and Ojumose, areas among others.
Residents of the affected areas who have be in the darkness for about eighteen to twenty months called on the BEDC to expedite actions on the faulty transformers and restoration of electricity supply as soon as possible in the affected streets.
Investigation conducted by our reporters revealed that economic and social activities have been grounded in the affected areas as a result of total darkness in the affected areas.
Those affected mostly by the outage in the affected streets are cyber café operators, artisans such as welders, sawmillers, electricians, barbers and hairdressers. Also affected are hotels, cold room as well as business centres, who have been compelled to seek alternative sources of electricity for their operations.
Reacting to the development, a cross sections of the inhabitants of the affected areas alledged officials of the BEDC of been behind the vandalised transformers.
They described the situation as painful and unexpected against the backdrop of what they described as the huge exorbitant and crazy bills been charged by the electricity company every month in the areas..
In his own reaction, a community leader in the palace of Ewi who does not want his name mentioned, described the situation as unfortunate, he lamented that the situation has caused untold hardship in the affected streets, he however called on the management of the BEDC to expedite actions on the repairs of faulty transformers.
In his reaction, the Public Relations Officer of the organisation, who also doubles as a Senior Commercial Officer in charge of Ondo and Ekiti, Mr Kayode Brown, exonerated the officials of the organisation from the vandalised transformers, as erroneously alledged by some residents of the affected areas.
Brown flanked by the Director of Technical Department if the organisation, equally debunked the allegation of ineptitude of staff of the BEDC towards the plights of the customers, explained that the policy of the organisation on what he called delinquency report to reconnect or change any faulty transformers is always sacrosanct.
Lamenting what over what he described as frequent attack and vandalisation of BEDC transformers in different parts of the state, the development which he said has affected the effectiveness of the organisation.
The Senior Commercial Officer of the BEDC, equally debunked the allegation of crazy bills alledged by the residents of the state, stressed the needs for the people to join hands with the organisation in protecting transformers mounted in different streets and communities in the state.
Speaking on the proposed power outage in Ondo and Ekiti states earlier scheduled to begin on July 1st, 2024, Brown said the move is targeted towards carry out some maintenance in the Oshogbo power station of the BEDC before it was postponed by the top management of the organisation.