The electricity billing regime currently imposed on residents of Owerri Municipal and its environs by the Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC) has crossed the line from inefficiency into outright provocation. What consumers are experiencing today is not billing; it is daylight robbery masked as corporate routine, executed with impunity and defended with silence.
Across Owerri, households are being slammed with monthly electricity bills that bear no relationship to supply, consumption, or common sense. Families struggling under severe economic pressure are being asked to pay as though they enjoy uninterrupted, premium power. This is happening in a city where darkness still competes aggressively with light.
The most scandalous dimension of this situation is the treatment of Egbu Community, the host community of the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN). It is an irony bordering on cruelty that a community hosting critical national power infrastructure is left in near-perpetual darkness, managing a paltry average of three hours of electricity daily.
Yet, in this same environment of epileptic supply, bills arrive with astonishing confidence. Two-bedroom flats and modest residential apartments are hit with charges of up to ₦150,000 monthly, while small and medium business premises are being burdened with figures as high as ₦180,000. These amounts would be questionable even with steady power, let alone under the current reality.
Residents concede, reluctantly, that power supply has marginally improved compared to the darkest days. But improvement does not justify extortion. It does not validate a billing structure that ignores usage, supply hours, or the economic condition of consumers. Progress cannot be priced like punishment.
More troubling is the timing of these inflated bills. They surged immediately after the Imo State Government announced plans to float the Orashi Electricity Company. To many consumers, this reeks of opportunism—an attempt by EEDC to extract as much as possible before a new power regime potentially alters the landscape.
Governor Hope Uzodimma had promised 24-hour, seven-day power supply in Owerri and surrounding areas once Orashi Electricity becomes operational. The timeline initially pointed to November. November passed. December followed. January came and went. Now, February 2026 is being floated, while residents remain trapped between promises and predatory billing.
In all of this, regulatory oversight appears either absent or complicit. Estimated billing, long condemned nationwide, is being weaponized in Imo State with renewed aggression. Meters are scarce, transparency is nonexistent, and consumer complaints are treated with bureaucratic disdain.
The injustice is even more glaring outside the urban core. Semi-urban communities like Egbu scarcely see electricity at all, yet they are not spared the culture of arbitrary charges. Darkness is normalized, neglect is institutionalized, and accountability is completely missing.
Small business owners, artisans, and traders are being pushed to the brink. Many have openly described EEDC’s actions as witch-hunting—a systematic assault on consumers who lack the power to resist a monopoly. This perception did not arise in a vacuum; it is the product of repeated abuse.
This situation demands immediate intervention. EEDC must halt these outrageous bills, review its billing methodology, and issue refunds or credits where consumers have been clearly overcharged. The Imo State Government must also rise beyond announcements and timelines and protect its citizens from corporate exploitation.
Electricity is a public utility, not a luxury item to be rationed and overpriced at will. If this billing madness continues unchecked, public trust will erode further, resistance will grow, and responsibility will be assigned—rightly—to those who chose silence over action. Imo residents deserve power, fairness, and respect, not darkness served with inflated bills.
