No fewer than 5,000 youths in Niger State Tuesday stormed the regional office of the Abuja Electricity Development Company, AEDC and the state House of Assembly in Minna, to protest incessant power outages in the state.
They claimed the state has been in darkness for over two years.
The protesters threatened that further outage, especially between now and January, 2017 would not be tolerated.
They displayed various placards with inscriptions such as ‘Bring back our light’, ‘AEDC must go’, ‘No light in Minna’, ‘We say no to darkness.’
Speaking to newsmen during the protest, spokesman of the youth association, Mohammed Mohammed, said: “For more than two years now, Niger State has been in darkness.
“Officials of AEDC promised that there would be steady power supply till December, but it has not been so. We have told them that we need steady light for 24 hours and pre-paid metres must be given to all consumers in the state.
“Niger State deserves to have steady power supply since we have three major dams; failing which we will continue to advocate and fight for our right,” he added.
While receiving the protesters at the AEDC, the Regional Manager, Engr. Mazi Abednego, assured that there would be improvement as measures were being taken already.
Speaker of the state House of Assembly, Ahmed Marafa, said their demands would be looked into as the power situation had affected all sectors.
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