Out of the N59.2billion earmarked for the National Mass Metering Project by the Federal Government, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has released N33.2billion to electricity Distribution Companies (DISCOs) in the country, it has been learnt.
Chairman of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), Engineer Sanusi Garba, disclosed this during an interactive session between the Senate Committee on Power, NERC officials and representatives of the DisCos, in Abuja on Thursday.
Garba said the project which is targeted at one million unmetered houses across the country and billed for execution between October 2020 and April 2021 has only attained 13 per cent implementation as at 19th of March 2021.
He attributed the poor performance to delay in disbursement of funds, the chunk of which he said was made available to the DISCOs in February this year.
Members of the committee expressed dismay over the 13 per cent performance of the NERC on Mass Metering Project in the country despite N33.4 billion already released to DisCos by the CBN.
Apparently not impressed by the performance report reeled out by the NERC Chairman, members of the committee chaired by Senator Gabriel Suswam (Benue North East), took turns to berate the Commission and the DisCos for their poor performance.
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