Following the construction of the 2nd Niger Bridge, activities of Julius Berger Plc, along Atani road, in Anambra State, have affected the underground cable powering Enugu Electricity Distribution Plc, EEDC’s Iyiowa 11KV feeder, thereby forcing over 4,200 households into darkness.

This development has subjected businesses, according to residents residing in Iyiowa and Odekpe areas of Anambra State, into untold hardship in the past 18 days.

IBrandTV, gathered that the incident occurred on the 7th of February, 2020, and since then, the Iyiowa 11KV feeder has been out of supply due to the underground cables that were punctured in many sections by the heavy equipment belonging to Julius Berger.

While briefing newsmen about the development, the Head of Communications, EEDC, Mr. Emeka Ezeh, Wednesday, said: “The construction company embarked on excavation of the cable corridor without notifying EEDC to assist by granting outage or possibly deploying its cable locator equipment, to properly identify the location of the cable.

“Usually, before such a project is embarked on, the contractor is expected to engage EEDC to ensure safety precautionary measures are in place and to also provide technical assistance by assigning its staff familiar with the network, to ensure proper management of the electrical asset during excavation.

“This negligent by Julius Berger resulted to damaged and punctured EEDC cables by their heavy equipment. We have had other incidents in the recent past where their team or sub-contractors worked in areas within our cable corridor at the location without recourse to our organization, and also damaged our cables and assets.

“This forced outage has significantly resulted to high loss of revenue to our organization, equally disrupted commercial activities and subjected our customers to avoidable inconveniences.

“We therefore use this medium to appeal for the understanding of our esteemed customers affected by this situation, while we continue to follow up with Julius Berger for a lasting solution to this issue.”

It was gathered that EEDC has officially written to the Management of Julius Berger PLC on this development, through its Commercial Manager, Bridge Head Yard, Ogbaru, but still awaiting their response.