According to the ERC, the new plan will see everyone paying their 'true' consumption of electricity per month. [Photo/Star]
Electricity bills are set to rise from April this year, with all subsidies for small consumers expected to come to an end.
This means the common mwananchi will be required to pay more, with those of middle-income and high income set to drop.
According to the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) Director General Pavel Oimeke, consumers will now be paying the true amount of consumption of electricity.
“The new plan is to make people pay the true cost of electricity at a time when the government is working to bring down the overall cost of power,” said ERC director-general Pavel Oimeke.
“We don’t have a situation where people with small cars and fuel tanks pay less for petrol since their demand is low, so why should we have that disparity in electricity?” he added.
According to the commission, the middle-income class and the top class, who use more electricity per month have been paying for the low-income earners, in a programme devised by the government to cushion low-income earners from paying a lot.
In the current system, low power consumers (using 50 units and below per month) pay Sh2.50 per kilowatt hour (kWh), while households consuming between 51-1,500 units pay Sh12.75 per unit.
Those consuming above 1,500 units pay Sh20.57 per unit, eight times more.
This will be a big blow for the common mwananchi, with the cost of living ballooning every single day.