Sapele residents send SOS to FG over poweroutage

Sapele – Residents of Adidi Road in Sapele, Sapele
Local Government Area of Delta State, have sent a
save our soul, SOS, to the Federal Government to
come to their aid by restoring public power supply
to the area, following what they described as
negligence of Sapele Distribution Unit of Power
Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, to provide
them with electricity.
The residents, who staged a peaceful protest, said
they were deliberately neglected by staff of the
company, despite their repeated demands to the
company to that effect, adding that they had
suffered unimaginable economic losses, while the
activities of night robbers, who operate under cover
of darkness, had become frequent in the area.
One of the residents, Mr. Benson Tobi, told
Vanguard that the people of the area had written
several letters to Sapele and Benin offices of PHCN
to fix the only transformer in the area, which he
claimed was given to the area by the state
government, but with no luck.
He described as laughable, claims by officials of
Sapele business unit of PHCN, that the transformer
was damaged by flood, noting that on the
contrary, that the transformer was damaged as a
result of negligence on the part of officials of the
company.
When contacted, the Sapele Business Unit
manager, Engr. Denis Okonkwo, said the Adidi
Road transformer was parked off, when water
entered its reserviour during a recent flooding of
the area, which had presently made it difficult to
repair and that unless another one was provided
by the government, there was nothing they could
do to correct the problem of power outage in the
area.
Meanwhile, residents of Nana Road, Dore Numa
Road and Water Soad in Sapele, have called on the
state governor, Dr Emmanuel Uduaghan to prevail
on the Town Planning Officials of Sapele council to
demolish all illegal structures blocking the natural
waterways in the area. They insisted that the illegal
structures in the area had worsen the flooding,
which destroyed their property and made life
unbearable for them in recent times.