From TONY JOHN, Port Harcourt
The Transmission Company of Nigeria, Port Harcourt Region has decried the spate of transformer vandalism and right of way obstruction in six mandate states.
The TCN raised the alarm concerning the situation in Abia, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Cross River, Imo and Rivers States, saying the vandalism poses challenges to equipment transportation.
General Manager, TCN, Port Harcourt Region, Inugonum Thomas, stated this shortly after facility tour in Port Harcourt, Rivers State at the weekend.
He called on the federal government to deploy military personnel and operatives of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) to secure the power equipment.
Thomas said the transmission sector is important in the power chain, which underscores the need for the transmission lines to be safe at all times.
He said: “Many times, we suffer from people attacking the transmission lines, destroying it, removing parts of the towers, making us not to have the transportation done easily.
“I remember sometime when I joined my colleagues to the bushes to see these transmission lines that have failed and what has caused it. We saw some hoodlums even attacking the gas pipeline as well as our own transmission lines. If we are not lucky that day, they would have shot us. So, the vandalization is virtually every time.
“The right of way of our transmission lines is another challenge we are having, because most times, the moment you come that you want to start a project, the community sees that there is movement here,
“Once they see that it is a project that is going to help them, it becomes a problem. They will want to stop it by all means. So I began to wonder, you want to give somebody food and he said no. And he doesn’t even have the food.
“There was a particular project we want to construct in Akwa Ibom, overnight the community people dug 500 graves, because they want to demand for compensation.”
He said most times in Calabar, Cross River State and Elelenwo in Obio/Akpor Local Government Area of Rivers State, the firm’s transmission lines were vandalized repeatedly for two months until the intervention of security personnel.
Thomas continued: “When people are doing these evil things they are not thinking because in the process they will kill so many people. Once that tower rests in our house, if it is 100 houses nobody will come out. It is as bad as that.
“So, I call on the government to help us. If it means sending some military men or NSCDC to our stations so that they can monitor them, because there are some of our stations when you come they (vandals) have already cut the earth conductors for big transformers that cost almost N800,000 million.”