Minister of Energy Peter Kapala has said that the position of the government, the Ministry of Energy, and his office is that ZESCO has to follow the procedure in changing any charges or fees under it.
In a post on Facebook, Mr Kapala said that ZESCO has to follow what the regulator, Energy Regulation Board(ERB) has said concerning the connection fees.
Mr kapala said that the removal of the subsidy, which cushioned the cost of connections and meter separation, in line with the provisions of the law, can only be done through ERB and not by ZESCO alone.
Mr Kapala said that ERB has indicated that the application by ZESCO to revise connection charges by 213 percent was deferred, pending an in-depth study and further consultations and that ERB expects ZESCO to resubmit an application for connection and meter separation fees once the conditions given to the utility firm are met. ERB has also revealed that at the last tariff application in 2019, ZESCO applied for a revision in electricity tariffs and connection charges, but at the time only the tariffs were approved and revised.
“ERB was established by the laws of Zambia to regulate undertakings/utilities in the energy sector including Electricity, Fossil Fuels (petroleum) and Other Forms of Energy such as solar and coal, through specialised licences it would issue.
“Currently, regulated utilities include ZESCO, Copperbelt Energy Corporation and Lunsemfwa Hydro Power Company under the electricity sub-sector. ERB also regulates the refining, marketing of, importation and transportation of crude and finished petroleum products under the petroleum sub-sector.
“According to the Energy Regulation Act No. 12 of 2019 and the Electricity Act number 11 of 2019, the functions of the Energy Regulation Board include to “determine, regulate and review charges and tariffs in the energy sector”. This includes fees and tariffs charged by ZESCO, concluded the statement
This statement from the minister has embarrassed the Zesco board and management for arbitrarily hiking electricity connection and metre separation charges. Lawlessness mustn’t be entertained.
I totally support ERB stance on this one. It goes to show how expensive ignorance can be. Shame on the Minister and ZESCO Board.
The Honourable Minister issued two contradictory statements yesterday, the first where he agreed with Zesco over the increases and this one where he is now supporting the ERB’s decision. Many bloggers attacked him over the first statement . His second statement was obviously a reaction to the attacks. Bwana Minister, don’t you have people to advise you before you issue any statement? As it is, people will start questioning your competence to run the Energy ministry.
The honorable minister is only procrastinating. Just wait for a week and he will come up with some bizarre explanation.
Chipante pante government, this one is.
This ministry he doesn’t which side he is on…yesterday he was supporting ZESCO and today he supporting ERB….kikikikikiki chimbwi no plan government……how do we end up with incompetent ministers like this…effects of having a demagogue President HH in office
I think the best thing is to support inniatives that will increase connection and marginal contribution to total leverage already with smaller capital base on retail higher tariffs than per capital incomes the sales risk for Zesco is high and it could be higher on their Financials as more customers switch to alternatives and also in an event of generation outages due to climate So the best way is to increase customers and connectivity and transform all business segments together because electricity prices have already reached a tipping point so gov must look at reinvesting as more capacity in installed come on this year
Equity and social economics and sustainability Good decision though