FCE Okene Goes on Forced Vacation over 42-day Power Outage

…AEDC says it’s addressing complaint

Emmanuel Addeh in Abuja

The management of the Federal College of Education (FCE), Okene, Kogi State, has said the school closed down six weeks ago due to power outage over a faulty 2.5MVA power transformer.

The institution, therefore, appealed to the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company (AEDC) to intervene in the matter to allow it resume normal academic activities.

According to a statement issued by the school at the weekend, “The damaged transformer has served for over 20 years and had become problematic for many months.

“While the second semester was supposed to start in October 2022, the power outage has forced students to remain at home as the management pressed on AEDC to replace the faulty transformer.

“We need the electricity supply to run the entire school-lighting, pump water to the hostels, for the offices, the libraries, among others. The cost of running a diesel generator all day to power the school is enormous at this time.”

Also citing the concerns in the statement, some students of the college appealed for the quick intervention of AEDC to enable them return to class.

Some of the graduating students also called on the Minister of Education and President Muhammadu Buhari to prevail on the relevant quarters to replace the transformer as they would not want to miss the scheduled mobilisation for the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC).

The  management said AEDC generates between N3 million and N5 million monthly from the FCE Okene, and as such, should give priority to the institution in addressing the power constraint.

When contacted for comment on the power crisis at the college, the President, Nigeria Consumer Protection Network, Kola Olubiyo, described the development as embarrassing to the electricity supply service provider and the entire electricity industry value chain.

Olubiyo urged the AEDC management to expedite the procurement processes to replace the transformer to get the students back to school.

He also noted that the management of AEDC under the receivership management of United Bank for Africa (UBA) should attend to the situation and demonstrate strongly that it is prepared for business in the Nigerian Electricity Market.

In its response to the claim of power outage in the school, the management of AEDC confirmed the situation, and said all efforts were being made to fix the situation.

“We are on top of the situation, but it will take a minimum of 12 weeks (from the day the transformer broke down)  to tidy up  the procurement of a replacement  transformer and installation benchmarks needed  in ensuring that power supply is restored to the institution shortly,” it noted.