Says FG Never Increase Electric Tariff
![](https://thenigerialawyer.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Idrinstitute.jpg")
![](https://thenigerialawyer.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/2024.lidw_.jpg")
The Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo, has said that members of the House of Representatives have no powers to halt the Federal Government’s Public Works Programme.
According to him, only the president can halt the 774,000 jobs scheme which commenced on Tuesday.
“They were urging Mr President, (look at the resolution, they cannot actually mandate) – to see whether they could halt commencement of the programme, but Mr President had actually directed that we commence the programme. It is only Mr President that can actually say that we should stop implementation of the programme, so on the directive of Mr President, we have actually commenced the programme,” Keyamo said on Channels Television’s Politics Today.
The House of Representatives had last month passed a resolution mandating the minister to stay action on the planned implementation of the scheme.
The reps had insisted that the programme will not be implemented until a comprehensive list of beneficiaries from the Nigerian directorate of employment is made available.
But despite the hesitation by both chambers of the National Assembly, the programme has commenced across the country.
Under the scheme, 774,000 people are expected to be recruited by the Federal Government, with the sum of N52 billion, earmarked in the 2020 budget.
1,000 persons are to be employed from each of the 774 Local Government Areas in the country, for the programme which is said to be a post-COVID-19 poverty alleviation initiative, approved by President Muhammadu Buhari.
While speaking on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Tuesday, Keyamo, said the FG only adjusted some bands for consumers to pay what they are supposed to pay.
He said the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) did not consult him or other members of the committee working on the new electricity tariffs regime, before the announcement earlier in the day.
NERC again increased electricity tariffs payable by power consumers across the country.
Providing reasons for the latest tariff hike, the commission had said it considered the 14.9 per cent inflation rate rise in November 2020 and foreign exchange of N379.4/$1 as of December 29, 2020.
When asked whether the electricity distribution companies have the approval of the government to increase tariffs following the NERC directive, Keyamo said, “I am the chairman of the sub-committee consisting of the Federal Government side and Labour side that has been mandated to go round the country to interact and consult with stakeholders and the discos to find an acceptable and cost-reflective tariff that should be paid by Nigerians. We are still in the process of carrying out our assignment, we have not finished it.
“There has been no increase in tariff. What we agreed to do was to freeze certain bands. You know we have band A, B, C, D and so on and so forth. So, in the interim, what we did was to adjust certain bands and to ensure that certain persons who are supposed to be on some bands are not wrongly put on some other bands.
“What has just been done is adjustment of certain bands but there has not been any increase in tariffs.”
NIALS' Compendia Series: Your One-Stop Solution For Navigating Nigerian Laws (2004-2023)
Email: info@nials.edu.ng, tugomak@yahoo.co.uk, Contact: For Inquiry and information, kindly contact, NIALS Director of Marketing: +2348074128732, +2348100363602.
