Kenya Power has withdrawn its bid to raise tariffs by 20 percent, a bid that would have seen electricity costs skyrocket to an all-time high.
Instead, the company now says it is focused on lowering costs, curbing electricity theft and recovery of unpaid bills amounting to over Ksh27 billion.
“Currently as we speak there is no application for a tariff review. The last one was withdrawn because Kenya Power had a new board and they wanted to review some of the issues and they have not come back with it,” said Energy Cabinet Secretary Charles Keter as quoted by Business Daily.
Read: Kenya Power Board Summoned By EACC Weeks After Pushing Out CEO Benard Ngugi Over Tender Tussles
Kenya Power submitted the bid to raise power tariffs to Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (EPRA) in 2019, a move that was opposed to Kenyans.
If the bid was implemented, the consumption charge for usage of less than 100 kilowatts per month would have gone up to Ksh12.50 a unit from the current Ksh10.
The charge for consuming above 100 units was to rise to Ksh19.53 a unit from the current Ksh15.80.
As a cost-cutting measure, Kenya Power is working with Safaricom to instal smart electricity meters that will curb power theft and leakages at a cost of Ksh31 billion. The system will connect 330,300 meters to a central location and track electricity use, outages and load on transformers as well as read meters remotely. It is expected to cut costs by 23.93 percent.
Read: Kenya Power On The Spot For Demanding Ksh2.8 Billion For Power Connection
As of June 30, 2019, Kenya Power had an asset base of Ksh44.2 billion as compared to liabilities worth Ksh115.2 billion according to the auditor general Nancy Gathungu.
Kenya Power reported an unaudited net loss of Ksh2.98 billion in the financial year ended June 2020, as compared to a net profit of Ksh262 million it posted in the year to June in 2019.
The company reported revenues of Ksh133.18 billion, an 18.45 per cent growth compared to Ksh112.43 billion generated in the year ended June 2019.
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