THE Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) has postponed the hearing in the Benin Electricity Distribution Company (BEDC) against Independent Electricity Distribution Network (IEDN) indefinitely because it is before the court.
This is contained in a public notice of the NERC that The Nation sighted yesterday.
The notice submitted that “the Commission acknowledges that the matter is now subject to judicial review and hereby notifies the general public that the hearing shall no longer hold as scheduled as the parties are now required to present their positions to the court in a manner that respects the independence of the judiciary’’.
The notice, which the management issued on the postponement, was dated January 18, 2021.
NERC’s management urged the public to “take notice that the hearing scheduled for 19 January 2021 to consider the petition filed by Benin Electricity Distribution Plc (BEDC) against Asaba Distribution Limited (ADL) application for an independent electricitpety distribution network licence has been postponed indefinitely”.
The notice added that the hearing was meant to be conducted pursuant to Section 70 (2) of the Electric Power Sector Reform Act (EPSRA), clause 11 of the NERC Application for Licences Regulations 2010 and Section 17 of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (Business Rules of the Commission) Regulations (Business Rules) 2006 and considered by a panel of three commissioners.
It recalled that the Commission was served court processes on January 18, 2021 of a suit (FHC/ABJ/CS/36/2021) that was filed at the Federal High Court by BEDC on January 15, 2021 against the Commission and ADL.
BEDC, according to the notice, avers in the suit that it “has the capacity to and has in fact been supplying adequate and sufficient electricity that meets the demand of the Delta State Government for whom the IEDN licence is purported as being procured for within the BEDC electricity distribution area, including the designated area”.
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