By Ishaya Ibrahim, News Editor
The Nigeria Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) has told Nigerians not to be cowed into paying their landlord’s outstanding electricity bills.
The NERC said the practice is illegal because a court has ruled against such practice.
In Nigeria, many landlords pass off their outstanding of electricity bill on their new tenant.
“A Landlord’s outstanding electricity bills cannot be enforced on a tenant. A judge recently ruled that the bills of a previous tenant cannot be enforced on a new customer. Send us details if you are in such situations. ~Commissioner Nathan Shatti. #NERCLive,” NERC said in a tweet.
The NERC did not however address the question of how to dispose off the outstanding electricity bill of a newly acquired property.
Many Nigerian acquire property without resolving the liability on such property, especially outstanding electricity bills.
A major challenge that was also not address is who becomes liable for an electricity bill that accumulates when such property is in the market, that is, not in use by the current and old owner. This practice is common when a property on on estimated billing system.
@sadeniran has such a case that he has been dealing with.
He tweeted @NERCNG that: “Here is an inherited estimated bill of N192,000 from a demolished property before I bought it over, and @IkejaElectric has been deducting from my prepaid meter at every recharge.”
The NERC said customers with such complaints should send their details to complaints@nerc.gov.ng
But Nigerians noted that the platform doesn’t work.
“I don’t think this email is working. The best practice is that when you receive email(complaint) there should be a acknowledgement. But NO. There is no feedback mechanism. This simply means a lot of emails is still hanging there,”@olubowalejohns1 said.
@aadogie also added: “Does this complaints email work? I sent complaints on estimated billing (unmetered account March-May 2020) in June 15 2020 and only got a no reply mail acknowledgment and no correspondence ever since. IKEDC is just sharing estimated billing. I need response to the mail,” he said.