The Bureau of Public Enterprise (BPE) has been urged to ignore feigned agitations and proceed to hand over the Aba and Ariaria Power Distribution unit the rightful and competent firm that duly acquired it Geometric Power, instead of the Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC), currently in charge of the facilities in order to quickly resolve the power challenge facing the commercial nerve centre of the state and Sout-East region.
In a news conference in Owerri yesterday the Coalition of Eastern Nigeria Political Pressure Groups described as saboteurs those who are opposed to AFRIGEM handling the distribution of power within Aba and Ariaria, and supporting the continued industrial incapacitation of the region by EEDC. Leader of the group, Nze Elvis Agukwe, said it was clear that EEDC never got the right to handle the Aba and Ariaria axis which will drive the technological advancement of the South East.
He noted that since EEDC, took over power distribution in the South East, two years ago, power supply had gone from bad to worse and wondered why the company would want to cling to a “responsibility it clearly lacks the capacity to handle”. Agukwe who is a former Commissioner for Information and Strategy in Imo State regretted that personal interests and sheer greed were driving those opposed to the original plan of AFRIGEM taking over the distribution unit of Ariaria and Aba.
He noted that apart from the fact that Geometrics conceived and built the Aba Power Plant upon which BPE conceded the distribution unit to it, the man behind Geometrics, Prof Bath Nnaji had been an Igbo He also explained that all the political pressure groups in the South East decided to join the fray because of the misconception and misinformation being fed the people of the South East to supplant AFRIGEM in favour of EEDC.
He said Geometrics had not powered Aba before now “because of the wickedness of the Obasanjo’s administration which excluded the South East from the nation’s gas master plan.” Agukwe said now that the error had been corrected and the gas pipeline moved into South East, the power plant would soon roar into life to provide uninterrupted power supply to Aba and Ariaria.
