Tricky cartels Kenya Power yet to ‘domesticate’

@steveumidha

Slum areas are safe haven to several violent cartels responsible for illegal power connections, a thorny issue the Kenya Power is yet to completely tackle if it is to recuperate millions it is losing in the trade.

Generally, these individuals charge a minimum fee of Sh 2,000 per connection per household in a slum dwelling (that is Sh1, 000 for single bulb connection) including additional Sh2, 000 monthly charges associated to maintenance fees.

Most slum households use at least two bulbs, and are charged every month by these cartels – making it more costly compared to in tokens.

The amount is equally higher than KPLC’s Sh15, 000 one-off connection fees for households in the radius of 600metres from transformer.

Kenya Power’s managing director Dr. Ben Chumo yesterday Tuesday that while the company was not losing substantial amount in the illicit trade, extra efforts were being laid out to tame possible upsurge of cartels in the industry.

“An illegal power connection is still not a crisis in Kenya at the moment since reported cases are mainly happening in slums and not with manufacturers who are the major consumers of electricity. We are however going to continue to monitor the situation to ensure the industry is free from these cartels,” said Dr. Chumo in a telephone interview.

The brutal cartels are understood to be minting millions of shillings from the black market at the expense of the firm while exposing thousands of lives in slums areas.

Mr. Chumo however, declined to disclose the magnitude of losses Kenya Power was exposed to in terms of revenues saying, “We are not losing a substantive amount from these cartels.”

Kenya Power’s manager Safety, Health & Environment John Guda did not however rule out the possibility that individuals involved in the illegal connections were being helped by some of the company’s employees who were equally profiting from the trade.

“We have not heard of cases touching our staff, but I can’t rule out the possibility all together. Persons involved in the informal connections have a bit of knowledge in ‘wiring’ and are taking advantage of clients who have no idea about these cartels,” he said.

Previous reports had indicated that the operatives were not in the business ‘alone’ and were colluding with some Kenya Power employees in supplying power to households without the consent of the company, a trade that has since spiraled to other slums outside Nairobi.

In April this year for instance, seven people were arrested in Nairobi for illegal power connections in an ongoing campaign to weed out illegal connections.

The company’s graphic figures indicate that Western, Nyanza regions and some parts of Nairobi were still leading in cases of illegal connections.

Kisii, Siaya, Homabay and Nairobi’s Mukuru Kwa Njenga and Reuben were earmarked for having recorded an increase in such cases.

Kenya Power confirmed that it had secured an additional Sh1.3billion loan facility from the World Bank which it will use to upscale the ongoing slum electrification project being implemented in various parts of the country in an effort to tame the vice.

The additional funding is a culmination of the Sh4.2billion the firm had acquired in 2011 for the financing of the Global Partnerships Output Based Aid (GPOBA) which has so far connected 1,271,915 homes in 40 counties over the last 5 years since 2011.