The Kaduna Electricity Distribution workers have kept millions of residents in darkness across Kaduna, Kebbi, Sokoto and Zamfara despite the intervention of Governor Uba Sani.
KAEDCO spokesperson Abdulazeez Abdullahi disclosed this in a statement while updating the workers’ mass action, which resulted in the blackout in Kaduna, Kebbi, Sokoto and Zamfara.
The state council of the National Union of Electricity Employees are protesting KAEDCO’s sack of hundreds of workers.
Mr Abdullahi said despite the efforts of KAEDCO, the Kaduna government and other stakeholders to “negotiate a resolution, the members have declined to restore power supply” since the outage began on Monday.
“Several meetings involving security agencies and government officials took place, culminating in a high-level discussion chaired by His Excellency, the Executive Governor of Kaduna State, Senator Uba Sani, represented by Her Excellency, the Deputy Governor of Kaduna State, Dr Hadiza Sabuwa Balarabe.
“Her Excellency emphasised the severe consequences of the outage on healthcare, businesses and essential services, urging the labour unions to consider restoring power while negotiations continue,” stated KAEDCO.
KAEDCO added, “However, the union representatives introduced new and unreasonable demands as conditions for restoring power, resulting in a deadlock.”