PHED MD Urges Employees to be Innovative

The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Port Harcourt Electricity Distribution (PHED) Plc, Dr.  Benson Uwheru, has urged employees of the company to be solution driven and hunger for innovative and more creative ways of performing their assignments.

He gave the charge at a strategic session with his executive team following the recent orders marshalled out to power distribution companies in Nigeria by the sector regulator, Nigeria Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC).

Uwheru pointed out that as many as 70,000 customers of the company have not vended in the last six months, yet they are connected to the company’s network.

He wondered how the company could continue to provide stable and quality power supply to its customers if the company is not being paid for services provided. He implored the team to deploy every available resource to collect monies owed the company by customers.

Uwheru declared that every employee of the organisation is now a Techno-Commercial staff and directed that all staff should be involved in the company’s revenue drive, including himself, noting that the Storm activities should be from the first day of the month to the last day of the month.  

Speaking further at the strategy session, he informed that the implication of the NERC order is that the company must set and meet a N6 billion target monthly.

Propounding the Blue Ocean theory, he directed every possible strategy should be deployed towards revenue drive in the company, via transformers, feeders, and technically and commercially driven in every region across its franchise area.

In another development, PHED is further deepening its partnership with First Independent Power Limited (FIPL) to further consolidate on the gains of the existing partnership with the global energy firm.  

At a business meeting held at PHED headquarters recently by both companies to review progress made, Uwheru informed that his first assignment when he assumed office was to discuss the PHED/FIPL partnership with the industry regulators and fine-tune strategies on the way forward so that the laudable initiative of both companies will not suffer delay or setback as they move to improve on the successes achieved.

Recall that both companies had entered a strategic partnership in the year 2020 to ensure that quality and stable power supply is delivered to PHED Plc. customers across its franchise area. In that year, one megawatt was delivered and added to PHED’s network, and in 2021 another 12 megawatts was added. PHED customers, mostly Maximum Demand (MD) customers in the Port Harcourt metro have benefited from this partnership, and expansion to other areas in the PHED franchise is being considered.