Does NEPA Plan with Viewing Centers?

Football fans viewing

The 21st century came with a lot of frenzies in Nigeria, a notable one is the exposure of Nigerians to European club football. Millions of Nigerians (youths and elders alike) have become die-hard enthusiasts of clubs in the top European football leagues. This has brought to the country a new business; football viewing centers.

Owners of these viewing centers subscribe to the major cable networks available in Nigeria such as DSTV, GOtv and Arabsat earning them the capacity to show live matches from all over the globe; especially Europe. Football lovers religiously troop to the viewing centers to watch their ‘idols’ live.

The average fee nationwide for gaining entry into the centers staggered between N 40 and N 50, but today it is as high as N 150 in some parts of the country. The price also depends on the sophistication of the center.

Just like in every nation, there exists an agency responsible for the generation and distribution electric power in Nigeria. The power authority in Nigeria has been known by different names.

The first national power agencies in Nigeria were the Electricity Corporation of Nigeria (ECN) and the Niger Dam Authority (NDA). The ECN ordinance No.15 which was passed in 1950 brought about the merger of these two agencies to form a new entity called National Electric Power Authority popularly known by the acronym; NEPA. 

The merger was to take effect on April 1^st 1972 but was only fully settled on January 6^th 1973 when the first boss was appointed. People from earlier generations have asserted that the beginning of the power crisis in Nigeria started with the switch to this acronym (NEPA).

In 2005, during the privatization campaign of then President Olusegun Obasanjo, the Electric Power Sector Reform Act was formed which was the first official step towards the privatization of NEPA. In the late 2000s, NEPA got another name-change and became NEPA plc after which its name was completely changed to ‘Power Holding Company of Nigeria’ (PHCN). 

On September 30^th 2013, PHCN was privatized by then President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan and was broken down into different blocks owned by different moguls in the various regions of the country.

The transformation of the power agency from one entity to the other has seen an ever growing magnitude of corruption perpetrated by the holders. From over-charging the masses to the collection of money even when power is not supplied.

However, there seems to be a crime greater in magnitude to the aforementioned two. In some parts of Nigeria, theory has it that workers in the various power agencies connive with viewing centers to extort the masses. In some areas, there is almost always never power supply when football matches are being played. Football loving masses are therefore ‘forced’ to go to viewing centers to pay to watch the matches and the viewing centers ‘settle’ the power agency workers afterwards.

The city of Minna, the Niger state capital, is a place where this theory can be upheld as true. The slums of the city; particular Bosso (an area with a rich student population) are places where residents begin to panic whenever ‘star’ football matches are to be played because they (the residents) can almost swear that there will be a power cut. 

This is therefore a call to capable individuals to investigate this phenomenon and punish perpetrators if they exist or calm our nerves if proven otherwise.

Please, if you support the motion that says ‘NEPA and viewing centers are partners in crime’ leave your comment below stating the place(s) you think this practice is in place.