Thirty communities in Ilorin, Monday, staged a peaceful protest over total blackout they have experienced in the last six months. The protesters said they saw electricity last in their communities on November 20, 2018.
As early as 7am, members of the affected communities besieged the Oloje undertaking office of the Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company (IBEDEC,) located in front of Oloriegbe compound, preventing officials of the company from opening for business of the day.
They decried the continued operation of the company in the areas without anything to show for the communities in terms of service delivery and regular supply of power.
The protesters who carried placards with various inscriptions insisted that the company must quite the office in the area or immediately restore power to the Oloje feeder which serves the entire communities.
Some of the inscriptions on the placards read;
“We are tired of blackout for 6 months,Oloje and Pakata Feeders are in blackout out for 6 months,” Find solution to our problems’.
Others are “Six months total blackout is Enough”, “IBEDEC vacate our commuties” ,Oloje and Pakata Feeders”, Enough is enough”.
They said all efforts and series of meetings held with the management of the IBEDEC at Baboko Business office and Ibadan office of the company has not yielded any results.
A soft drink seller who ran into to the protest midway and spoke with journalists, lamented that the situation had crippled economic activities of many people especially the Petty readers in the affected communities.
“Everyday we have to go extra miles to get ice- block which is not profitable to us.We are getting frustrated”, she said.
The affected commuties are Alore, Oloje, Ita- merin, Banni,Abayawo, Gunniyan, Anifowose,Pakata, Alfa -Yahaya, Oke-Agodi, Agbarigidoma,Gaa Oke-Idi emi, Ogidi, Temidire,
Others are Abemi, Adeta, Aiyekale, Ifesowapo, Sakele, Olomoda, Albarika, Iberuoluwa, Ajegunle, Gaa -Osibi,Ifedayo, among others.
When contracted, an official of IBEDEC in Ilorin, explained that efforts were on top gear to solve the problem.
The source who do not want to be mentioned in print because he does not have the mandate to speak with the press, disclosed that the management of the company has held a meeting with representatives of the communities where they briefed them on level of progress made so far.
The source added that the company had taking delivery of the equipment to be installed to restore power to the affected areas.
“We even invited some of them to see the equipment that is waiting to be installed, we are surprised to hear that they are protesting this morning.
“We want to appeal to them to be patient as work is already ongoing to fix the faulty equipment .Is not something that can be done in a hurry, it requires some technical and administrative procedures which we want them to please understand”,the source said..
