Residents protest Power outage in Benin City, Edo State.

 Residents of Ugbiyoko community, Egor Local Government Area of Edo State, stormed the headquarters of the Benin Electricity Distribution Company on Monday to protest prolonged power outage in the area.

It was learnt that the over 70 electricity consumers, comprising men, women and youths‎ trooped to the disco’s office located on Akpakpava road as early as 4am, with placards, one of which read, “We are tired of blackout.”

W‎hen correspondents got to the scene of the protest, some of the protesters were seen treating themselves to a meal which they prepared in front of the company.

They also shutout some staff of BEDC and vowed to continue the protest until the management of the company responded to their demand.

Some security operatives were, however, at the scene to prevent the aggrieved residents from grounding traffic in the area.

Correspondents gathered that the ‎community had been out of power supply for about three months, due to a faulty transformer, which was said to have been removed by the distribution company.

But the protesters said they were yet to take delivery of a replacement and had since been cut out of power supply, which had affected livelihoods of residents in the community.

They also noted that they had provided copies of their electricity bills and brought several forms, in order to register their grievance, but were yet to get any result.

‎The residents, however, vowed to continue the protest until a new transformer was provided for them.

“For the past three or four months, the one that was there was bad and was removed. After removing, are you not supposed to bring a new one to the place?

“We are tired. If you see the body of the children now, they are full heat rashes‎. Our fridges had turned to cupboards because there is no light and they still remove the N750 charge.

“Why? They should give us the transformer today,” one of the residents, who identified herself as Mrs. Odogwu, told  correspondents.

PUNCH Report