The ‘short story’ already posted on my ‘book_face’ serves as the background to this study. It was so serious that I had to post it on the 26th anniversary of 9/11. I do not mean ‘911’, the lorry; I mean the global terrorist shock and awe of 11/9/01, 2001. And come to think of it, what these DISCOS, always dancing in the dark and with darkness, do to us is pure socioeconomic terrorism. The only difference is that they operate under the protection of the state, which is why they are called SARS: State-Assisted Robbery Squads. Anyway, read this background to the study. It is factual except that there was no one-eyed woman anywhere!
These Village People AGAIN!!
I just finished spending part of my annual leave at Igbo-ukwu…as USUAL. As I was returning to base, I had bags of assorted items: oranges, guava, banana, plantain, coconut, ube (a local fruit), and two containers of well-garnished soup and stew. I left in high spirits and got to my house of exile in Ijebu-Ode also in high spirits.
But that was where and when the highness of the spirits crashed. I had not even unlocked the door to my underutilised flat when my landlord informed me that those who understand transformers and their cables had vandalised our local transmission system and that there had been no light here for the previous 3 weeks. I asked him why he didn’t inform me earlier, and he said he didn’t want me to stay further in the village.
So, what did our tormentors, IBEDC, do? They just gave us a bill of N1,800,000 and went back to their office, awaiting our compliance. My joy turned into sorrow because my soup started ‘speaking in tongues’, the stew started ‘looking somehow’ and the fruits had turned pale due to poor refrigeration.
I was wondering why this bad fortune befell me, and then I recalled a one-eyed woman with deformed legs eyeing me wickedly as I left that morning. She was the monitoring spirit of the village people, and because I didn’t greet her well or ‘shake her hands’ that AM, she sent a negative report about me to their coven, and they decided to DEAL with me. And I did not insure those items!!! All my friends and well-wishers should please come to console me through my bank accounts, which are available in the cloud. Are you surprised? Why else do you think I am telling you this long story? Ik Muo, 7.30 PM, 11/9/25
I am embittered by my colossal losses from this incident, especially the soup and stew. I never cooked until I went for NYSC at GSS, Azare, Bauchi State, in 1980. But before I completed my service, I had become the best cook amongst my copper-mates. However, when I got married, I abandoned the kitchen and forgot my culinary skills. You now know why the soup and stew were of immense concern to me.
Now back to IBEDC. Which sensible businessman or organisation would leave its cash-generating asset fallow for one whole month? Dangote? Elumelu? Otedola? Innoson? The fact that IBEDC abandoned its revenue-generating transformer for this period, waiting for the consumers to ‘act’, tells us their kind of business strategy and model. You see, the hood does not make the monk. They claim to be private-sector investors, but they do not have a private-sector spirit. They brought in ‘NEPA people’ with the NEPA mindset, and we handed our national assets, probably underpriced, to them. There was no culture change, there was no strategic reconfiguration, and that is where we are. Of course, I am not surprised that some of them are now having running battles with BPE and the various banks over the very soul of these hurriedly cobbled-up entities. This is about their pitiable and weird business model.
The worst and most heart-wrenching was (and is) demanding that customers should pay for the transformer which was cannibalised by those who know how transformers work: IBEDC staff, their contractors and their suppliers. I CANNOT cannibalise a transformer because I don’t even know where to start. But the audacity becomes obvious when we do comparative scenario building. If thieves vandalise the extra-large generator which we use at OOU, will the VC ask staff and students to pay for the repairs? If MC Oulomo’s boys (he has been off the radar of late) invade and destroy machinery at Nestlé or Cadbury, will they ask the consumers of Milo and Bournvita to pay for the repairs? If students chanting ‘We no go agree’ along the Shagamu-Benin Motorway destroy the buses of GUO, Ekeson, TRACAS or The_Young, will they share the repair costs among their customers?
So what gave IBEDC the audacity to bill us for the repair of their machinery cannibalised by unknown thieves? Why will they punish us just because we are their customers? Is it an offence to be an electricity consumer in Nigeria? And with prepaid meters, for which we paid through the nose, we are no longer indebted to them! And what have the government and its agencies (starting from NERC) done about this abnormality? NOTHING, and that is what they are called: SARS: State Aided Robbery Squad. I know that you know the other SARS, which has been disbanded, but which you meet along the high and low ways, always! Nigeria… I HAIL THEE!
