KUALA LUMPUR: Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) has denied claims on social media that the government has instructed the utility company to increase electricity tariffs by 30 per cent.
TNB described the message, purportedly a directive issued by TNB's board of directors, as "false and baseless".
"The message, supposedly written by a TNB employee, is false and baseless. TNB does not have any employee as named in the message," said TNB in a statement today (May 29).
It added that electricity tariffs were set by the Energy Commission.
Titled "Catatan staff TNB" (notes from a TNB staff), the post was purportedly written by one Ahmad Fadhil Hanapi from Brickfields.
In the message, the writer said TNB had "no choice but to comply" with a directive from TNB's board of directors, which received orders from the government to raise electricity tariffs by 30 per cent.
The writer alleged that the increase happened without the knowledge of consumers, and was made to cover bonus payments to civil servants and retirees.
This posting came in the wake of complaints of unusually high electricity bills, experienced by consumers over the past week.
Yesterday (May 28), Energy, Science Technology, Environment and Climate Change Minister Yeo Bee Yin had listed a technical error as a possible cause to the matter.
Yeo said there was no change to the electricity tariff in May, but declined to go into details until the Energy Commission completed its probe.
"This month, there are 10 times more complaints, about 300 of them, (received by the commission, especially on unusually high bills)."
She said TNB had been summoned by the commission on Tuesday for an explanation on the matter.
The Energy Commission has been given 14 days from Tuesday to conduct its probe into the surge of complaints.