Payment plan offered for overdue electricity bills

TIRANA, Dec. 4 – OSHEE, the state-owned power corporation for electricity distribution said this week it would offer payment plans in installments to consumers who owe large amounts in overdue bills, adding that those who make a total payment would have the overdue charges cut by 80 percent.
The offer is valid until March next year, and it seems to be an effort by authorities not to impose harsh financial distress on those consumers that have not paid because they lack the money to do so.
The move was announced by the government and a statement by the OSHEE Supervisory Board.
Authorities have started a nationwide campaign in recent weeks to cut financial losses in the energy sector. They have cut to more than 600,000 illegal hookups to the power network in an effort to try to soften the crisis that had engulfed the state-owned power corporation. The crisis has generally due to the lack of payment by many consumers, businesses and individuals, and also technical losses in the network due to the lack of investments.
Prime Minister Edi Rama has said almost daily that theft of power consumption will be over once and for all or the country cannot move on economically.
“If we do not give an end to the energy theft, we cannot go ahead in a real and sustainable development for the country,” Rama said Monday in Fier.
The opposition reacted to the payment plans through Democratic Party leader Lulzim Basha, who said the move by the Socialist-led coalition showed the government was bowing to the opposition requests due to fears of political repercussions and a growth in unhappy voters.
Basha urged Albanians to pay their non-disputed bills, but also said authorities should not seek payment on bills that are under dispute and part of an appeals process.
Basha repeated accusations that the government was making selective power cuts to the consumers and was also favoring Socialist activists in leading the power corporation departments in certain districts.
Rama also appears to not have been happy with the work of OSHEE in the operation countrywide to cut the illegal power supplies, sacking OSHEE head Arben Seferaj, according to local media. Officially Seferaj resigned “for personal reason.”
He was replaced by Adrian Cela, a former department head at the corporation.
The government rebranded CEZ Shperndarje as OSHEE after nationalizing the power company it had earlier sold to CEZ Czech power corporation in a botched privatization that lasted several years and ended in a semi-amicable divorce.
With help from the World Bank, the government is hoping to stabilize the energy market in the country by 2018 and turn it into a profitable company.