PHOTO: Mr. Monie R. Captan speaking on Friday
By Frank Sainworla, Jr, fsainworla@yahoo.com
President George Manneh Weah has given the Liberia Electricity Corporation (LEC) a mandate “to go after” all those involved in power theft including higher-ups including officials, the Chairman of the Liberia Electricity Corporation (LEC), Monie R. Captan disclosed in Monrovia on Friday.
He said beginning next Monday, December 13, 2021, a hotline will be published on the Social Media for people to text messages/complaints on stealing of current in their respective communities, in order for prompt actions to be taken against those involved.
Mr. Captan was speaking on December 10, 2021 at a ceremony at the Liberia Electricity Regulatory Commission in Congo Town, when the LERC released a new revised tariff structure, reducing the cost of electricity in the country, which begins next January.
Power theft is now a crime in Liberia in October 2019, after an Act of the Legislature was passed and signed into law by the President few years ago.
Power theft, which is a second degree felony, is defined as tempering with, interference with, or improper use of electric meter by domestic consumer, and it is punishable with a definite prison term of not less than 2 years and not more than 5 years.
The LEC Board Chair emphasized that the time has come to set some examples on people in high and low places who are constantly involved in stealing current, something that has caused the LEC to suffer 60% commercial losses and 12% technical losses amounting to millions of US dollars every year.
“We have to stand up against this,” Mr. Captan said and made a passionate appeal to the public to give the LEC authorities tipoffs on people involved in power theft by utilizing the hotline.
A highly placed and credible source in the country’s electricity sector told www.newspublictrust.com over the weekend that some high ranking unnamed government officials, who are said to be using free current, have recently been boasting of how LEC can do nothing to them.
Many of their big buildings are said to be connected to the national grid but they have no meter and are stealing current and are believed to be in cohort with some elements of LEC.
Mr. Captan, former Chief Executive Officer of the defunct Millennium Challenge Account-Liberia (MCAL) and former Foreign Minister of Liberia, said that had it not been because of power theft, the new reduced electricity tariff could have gone down even further, below 30%.