Total blackout in Calabar as PHED withholds power

Economic, social and political activities in Cross River State have been brought to a standstill as Port Harcourt Electricity Distribution Company (PHED) have withheld power in the State.
Calabar, the Cross River State capital, has been thrown into darkness for almost a week now as PHED denied residents electricity supply.

Investigation conducted by DAILY POST revealed that cult related activities including armed robbery and kidnapping now strive in the state due to the perpetual darkness being experienced by the people are now living in fear of being victims.
The cut in power supply according to our findings has also affected social, economic and political life of the people. Social gathering such as football, parties, and night-vigils can no longer hold. Businessmen and women who make their living from selling of foodstuff, including restaurant operators, beer parlours have shut down operations.
Speaking with our correspondent, a cool store operator who gave his name as Thomas Akpan lamented the outage of electricity in the state capital, explaining that the situation has caused him untold hardship as he has lost several thousands of Naira.
“All the fish and meat as well as drinks I stored for my customers have defrosted and I have to call the owners on phone to come and pick them. Some of them have even spoiled. Tell me what I am going to do. I feed my family, train my children and pay house rents from the proceeds of this business, but now where should I go to?”

Also lamenting, a fish seller at Lagos street markets complained that where she normally puts her unsold fish has not had electricity for over a week. “The owner of the cold room called me today to come and remove my fish, where will I take them to? The restaurants I supply these fishes are not willing to buy more because of poor patronage,” She fumed.
Besides, restaurant and cold store operators, small scale businessmen also recounted their losses as a result of the blackout. Cobblers, aluminium and furniture makers, radio mechanics, carpenters etc also lamented the non supply of electricity but pointing out that despite the lack of electricity, ”these people will come around to disconnect us and asked us to settle bill for light we have not seen”
In a separate interaction with our correspondent, these skilled workers expressed sadness as they could not meet up with the demand of their customers and appealed to Power-holding company to come to their aides, “We could not meet up again. We have explained and tired to our customers and not everybody understand even when they saw that the fault is not from us.”
Interestingly, our correspondent who monitored the activities of Port Harcourt Electricity Distribution Company (PHED) observed that the company had announced that there would be power outage for two weeks due to an emergency maintenance in Ikot Ekpene/Calabar line.