Zambia Electricity Supply Cooperation(ZESCO) Senior Manager Electro-Technical Services Changala Nswana says ZESCO would soon commence the installation of prepaid meters in Livingstone and was targeting 14,000 residential and 1,000 commercial customers.
He said this yesterday in Livingstone during the launch of prepaid metering system project which arose from the successful pilot project which started in Lusaka and Copperbelt Province in 2006.
Mr Nswana explained that said phase 1 which began in Lusaka’s Emmasdale township was a great success for ZESCO because the customers accepted it adding that this is what has prompted ZESCO management to spread the installation of prepaid meters to other towns in the country.
He said so far the project had been successful in the Copper belt and Lusaka and that the power utility company was now rolling the project to Eastern province, Central, and Southern Provinces.
Mr Nswana said in its bid to cater for the target of 450,000 customers with prepaid metres, ZESCO has procured 400,000 prepaid meters from Zambia Electrometer and about 115 from South Africa.
In Livingstone, Mr Nswana said ZESCO had already established two vending centres for the sale of power units at ZESCO Regional office and Mosi-o tunya office.
He further added that the company had contracted 4 third party vendors in Ellaine Brittel, Dambwa, Maramba, and Linda compounds in Livingstone to make it easier for customers to access units.
Mr Nswana said ZESCO aims to have up to 90% of customers country wide on prepaid metering system by the end of 2012.
Meanwhile, ZESCO Customer Service Manager, Patrick Mwila urged members of the public to report any one found selling the prepaid meters because they were free of charge.
“ I want to take this opportunity to warn our customer to report to us any one selling these prepaid meters because they are free and should only be installed by ZESCO personnel,” said Mr Mwila.
And ZESCO Demand Side Management Manager Mr Wilcliff Chipeta said ZESCO got a loan worthy US $2 million which is about K10 billion from World Bank and purchased 1,000,000 Compact Fluorescent Lights for free distribution to its customers.
Mr Chipeta said 18,000 energy saving bulbs will be distributed in Livingstone District and urged the residents to exchange three ordinary bulbs with CFLs to prevent energy loss.
He also said commencement of installation of solar geysers will soon be communicated to the residents.
Many Livingstone residents have welcomed the projects which they said would drastically help them to cope with the huge bills and save money.
Ms Elizabeth Mbalwe noted that prepaid is a good thing because it is one way of teaching people how to budget and avoiding accumulating huge bills as they were free to control their power consumption.
ZANIS
Good work Zesco. Keep up!
But why are you jumping up and down with your project. You did the project half way in Chingola and we hear you are in Livingstone.Is it part of your poor planning or what. Come and finish the installations in Chingola before you move to another place.Amano yamu MMD.