Kwara community cries out for help over three years blackout

 

Residents of Aiyetoro Community, Zango-Kulende Quarters of Ilorin, Kwara State capital, have cried out for help after suffering three years of blackout resulting from the damaged transformer serving the community.

The highly-populated community was plunged into total darkness on October 20, 2020 after the electricity transformer secured from the then-government in 2009, broke down.

The transformer was also vandalized by unknown persons following the breakdown.

Findings by DAILY POST indicated that efforts to repair the faulty transformer in 2015 cost residents of the community about N1 million with input from the Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company, IBEDC, Baboko District, in Ilorin.

In 2020, another attempt to repair the transformer was put on hold following a directive by the government that no individual or community should shoulder the repairs of transformers anymore because it is the responsibility of IBEDC to do so.

The community then wrote the National Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC, in September 2022, through IBEDC, which resulted in a meeting with officials of the regulatory body from the Abuja headquarters and Aiyetoro Community leaders, though the meeting did not yield fruitful results.

Leaders of the community have also written to the state Commissioner and Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Energy, who promised to honour their request as soon as transformers are procured by the state government.

Efforts by our correspondent to reach officials of the state Ministry of Energy and IBEDC, Baboko District in Ilorin on Friday proved abortive.

Speaking on the issue, Chairman and Secretary of the Aiyetoro Community, Olufemi Alagbe, and Samuel Olajesu Adio, respectively, said the blackout has paralyzed the socio-economic activities of residents in the area.

They said it has also raised security concerns among residents as the community has been plunged into perpetual darkness for the past three years.

The only Junior/Senior Government Day Secondary School, Zango-Kulende, located within the community’s Polling Unit 033, Akanbi Ward (V), is also affected by the blackout as the science laboratory is not functional due to the blackout.

Also affected are private nursery, primary and secondary institutions in the area.

The community leaders appreciated the efforts of the state government in the provision of social amenities to communities in the last three and a half years and appealed for the area to benefit from such gestures.

He said aside electricity problem, there are no good roads in the entire community and other adjoining communities, which include Ajegunle/Agunbiade, Muyideen, and Orilowo among others.