Although none of the actors can prove authorization to distribute and collect electricity rent, the business prospers under the undaunted gaze of the sector authorities.
The well-known electricity distribution companies Electro-Luís and MJ, respectively, located in the neighborhoods of Mundial and 28 de Agosto, all in the municipality of Belas, in Luanda, stand out, among others, in the areas of Obama, Boa Esperança and Macuia, due to the fact that they have more than a hundred customers, as some residents of the aforementioned suburbs attested.
However, all where OPAÍS was present last week demonstrated difficulties in proving their legitimacy, as they were unable to provide documentary proof to this newspaper’s report. Emília, the MJ employee, who serves clients for registrations, monthly payments, fines or reconnections, confessed that, until the date of this interview, she had not bothered to have or question her superior about the documents that certify the legality of the company what is your work.
Having been at MJ for more than two years, Emília confessed that her lack of concern is due to the fact that her company’s clients never question its authenticity, but she promised that, from now on, she will try to demand from her boss, whom she calls Master, to provide it with the aforementioned document, which it intends to make available to users. “But I remember a man who had already asked me about this dossier, but he never showed up again, because my boss wanted to meet with him”, said the MJ employee, clearly demonstrating that the matter in question is reserved for the company leader.
Although he did not specify the number of customers, he said that under his control there are more than 100 users, who pay a monthly fee of 6 thousand kwanzas. According to her, these bills increase when some customers fail to pay by the tenth of each month. “Our charges are made under the type of service provided, which is why we set it from the 25th of a month to the 10th of the following month. And when we register some non-compliances, we apply the measure of payment of a fine of one thousand kwanzas, the same amount we charge for reconnection”, informed Emília, adding that, regardless of the months the customer owes, MJ will only charge him more. 2 thousand kwanzas, in addition to the usual six.
Regarding the price of the contract, Emília was not afraid to say that her company charges 105 thousand kwanzas. But she detailed that residents who wish to have electricity distributed by MJ can pay this amount in three installments. “Still, there are those who ask us to increase one or two installments and we have given in, because we realize the difficulties that residents may have in obtaining this money”, she declared.
Weak light among the causes of conflicts
For her part, Adelina from the company Electro-Luís, located close to the only paved road (main street) of the World Cup, began by saying that she was not authorized to give an interview. However, she let it slip that, when signing a contract, her company charges an amount slightly higher than that charged at the similar company MJ.
According to the newspaper’s team, through an unrecorded conversation, this institution, which also distributes electricity from a Transformer Station (PT), covers a good part of the World Cup, mainly the market and commercial area of this suburb. Because of this, one of the complaints that Electro-Luís has tried to manage, with some pedagogy, according to Adelina, is the weak intensity of the electrical current. “Some contract for home connections, but want to demand energy that can run business machines,” she stressed.
Delimitation of exploration areas
As Electro-Luís and MJ have customers in some areas of the same neighborhood, these and other companies that sell electricity to residents were able to reach an understanding, to the point of delimiting exploration zones, in order to avoid possible conflicts.
The measure pleased MJ more, which, by the way, has its company headquarters located on the same street as another competing distributor, which registers its customers’ homes with the letter L. Very recently, this company decided register your users with a very visible description, on the walls of their homes. According to its customers, the idea was to send the message that the houses in the 28 de Agosto neighborhood that are west of the Triângulo stop in the same neighborhood are responsible for distributing electricity. In fact, in the memoranda of understanding between the owners of these PTs, the colors to be used for registration were also decided.
Regarding this phenomenon, MJ and L employees chose, respectively, brown and blue, the colors with which they identify the homes of their clientele or the area to be explored with connections. In the Obama and Boa Esperança neighborhoods, this report’s team did not find PT holders, but, in conversation with customers, these residents said that, during the contract process, they were never shown an energy distribution authorization document. .
“What we were asked to see were, simply, some papers proving the concession of the Transformation Station (PT), but, as we are more interested in having light at home, we don’t pay much attention to the other part. Finally, OPAÍS found that most of the PT’s allocated to these dealers are 250 KVA, which justifies the weakness in the intensity of the electrical current in certain homes, as this capacity does not allow the provision of these services.