Ikeja Electric Distribution Company (DISCO) and the chief executive officers have scored low and negative acclaim as ‘ Worst Business People’ of the year 2025.
Making the announcement on Tuesday this week, the Nigerian Global Business Forum, (NGBF) a new association of Nigerian professionals listed Ikeja Electric and its directors as the WORST NIGERIAN BUSINESS PEOPLE of the year 2025 while the company was listed as the Most Cruel, Inhuman, UnGodly and Most Exploitative Business Venture in Nigerian recent economic history.
The NGBF said identifying people who lead corporations that enslave and impoverish Nigerians through unbridled exploitation and merciless profiting remains the hallmark of the Nigerian Global Business Forum, (YGBF).
In the statement released on Tuesday and signed by Dr Alaba Kalejaiye and Musa Ahmed the group said Ikeja Electric has brought the worst, unprecedented suffering and malicious profit into business relations in Lagos territory, an act that has destroyed the prospect of job creation, creative industry and enterprise across the Lagos hemisphere which represents over 60 percent of Nigerian industrial, health and commercial territories. NGBC said the conferment of the DISHONOUR on Ikeja Electric was important since the organization acts above the law and prides itself and beyond human sanctions an act that has left millions of Nigerians in penury, bankruptcy and even deaths.
‘The best we can do is to name and shame groups and individuals that have multiplied poverty and human misery in Nigeria.
Ikeja Electric has not only made life unbearable, but has contributed immensely to sudden death of many people occasioned by business bankruptcy, electrocution of innocent lives through power surges and outright robing of Nigerians their right to sustainable development which includes adequate provision of energy. In 2024 alone, Ikeja Electric received N466.69b of the N626.02b for consumers in the first quarter, receiving the highest. The company recorded revenue efficiency of 74.55%, according to Nigerian Electric Regulatory Commission, (NERC. Ikeja Electric Revenue for 2024 also hit N104.46bn by the Q3 but there is nothing to show for it for the consumers who pay through their blood for services not provided.
The NGBF said Nigeria and the South West economy has been stifled by the Ikeja Electric criminal enterprises that specialize in imposing a system of economic genocide on people that work and do their businesses in the Western region.
The group said Ikeja Electric has some 15million direct clients and over 50 million indirect end users having been tasked with the responsibility of providing electricity to Nigeria’s largest economic sector in Lagos of which many Nigerian artisans, industrialists, middle class operators, students, health, cultural and economic institutions are dependent.
‘Instead of adding value, Ikeja Electric has become the albatross, the slaughter house for many economic ventures and individuals that have either been frustrated out of business or ruined through the company’s gross inefficiency and the drive for primitive accumulation of wealth by the company led by the two individuals.
The group listed other reasons why Ikeja Electric was selected for the humiliating dishonour:
The loss of lives daily due to electric surge.
The destruction of properties and burnt buildings due to Ikeja Electric ceaseless, disruptions, epileptic attacks on the service lines, spontaneous high voltage and the desperation to sustain profit through mass scam.
The imposition of decree rates on consumers which has led to millions of people paying electricity bills, in some instances, twice their monthly salary being the worst set of business relationship in Nigerian history;
Sustenance of a bullying public relations regime that sees Nigerians as irritants that must be punished and humiliated while the company focuses on savage accumulation of wealth;
Conscious destruction of customers’ meters by specially recruited thugs forcing many end users to embrace direct energy connection giving the opportunity to Ikeja Electric to impose murderous bills at will;
Excessive and mindboggling profit in the face of extremely poor services and inhuman, wicked, heathen, fetish and savage activities of the company;
Lack of insurance for its workers that perform high risk services, the death of many of its workers in the course of their official duty, without adequate compensation, a situation where Ikeja Electric workers have become mere statistics since only profit matters;
Running a bullying public relations machinery that specializes in threats and assault as trademarks in dealing with customer’s numerous complaints;
The NERC said 60% of industrial electricity consumers have exited the National Grid, over 80 percent of them are in the South West. This marks the death of industrialisation in Nigeria;
Promoting energy crisis that has forced many health institutions to lose human lives especially where energy services are switched off at critical moments of deadly surgical operations, leading to deaths and forcing many companies to relocate from Nigeria;
Promoting large scale importation of solar equipment from Asia, as Nigerians seek alternative energy with serious consequences on foreign exchange mop up;
Laying the foundation for the destruction of education foundation which requires energy for scientific, cultural and economic research and innovations;
Completely absent synergy between Ikeja Electric and its customers from where the company derives her fortunes rather, rather, the company unleashes violence, awe and a season of terror on the long suffering end users;
Disconnection of the critical military store house where bombs and explosives were kept instead of resulting to peaceful and legal means of conflict resolution. With this action, Ikeja Electric took the risk of causing monumental explosion of bombs at Ikeja with a population of over 4million people, an incidence that could have led to genocide, all for profit.
The NGBF represents Nigerian professionals all over the world, committed to justice, corporate responsibility, liberty and human rights of the people. We promise Nigerians an international campaign against enemies of Nigeria like Ikeja Electric. This will include campaigns for Visa ban and economic sanctions against the manager of the company by the International community.
We seek more information from Nigerians on how they are treated by corporate organisations who blindly exploit and destroy their future.
The Federal and the Lagos State governments need to come to the aid of Nigerians, else, the public will take over the campaign for justice in the Electricity sector.
