The
Federal Government on Wednesday regretted that despite the various
efforts being put into stabilising the power sector; about 120 million
Nigerians were still in darkness.
The Minister of State for Power, Mrs.
Zaynab Kuchi, disclosed this while briefing State House correspondents
on the outcome of the weekly Federal Executive Council meeting presided
over by President Goodluck Jonathan.
She was joined at the briefing by the
Minister of Information, Mr. Labaran Maku; Minister of Power, Prof.
Chinedu Nebo; Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Mr. Godsday Orubebe; and
Minister of State for Niger Delta Affairs, Mr. Ishyaku Dahiru
The ministries of Power and Niger Delta Affairs had earlier presented their achievements and challenges for 2012 to the FEC.
Kuchi said for the entire 160 million
Nigerians to enjoy stable electricity supply, Nigeria must look in the
direction of Independent Power Projects.
She said the future of power generation and supply in the country rested with the IPPs and Public-Private Partnership.
The minister said the government was already looking in that direction.
She said, “Privatisation is at its
conclusive stage come July. What we need to focus on is the
commercialisation of the power sector, considering where we are and the
fact that we are only giving power to only 40 million Nigerians.
“We have 160 million Nigerians now and
we are only giving power to 40 million of that population. What it means
is that there are about 120 million Nigerians that are without power
and wish to buy power.
“We are looking into the energy mix;
what we are looking at are ways that will bring in so many other options
and the only way we can power Nigeria is to look forward to IPPs.
“We keep on saying we shouldn’t allow
imperialism; yes, we want foreign direct investments, but we also want
Nigerians to take ownership. If power sells on the street, power can
sell better because everybody wants power 24/7. We need to deliver power
to Nigerians and the only way to do this is by serious
commercialisation.”
Nebo, on his part, described the decline
being recorded in power supply in the last few weeks in the country as a
nightmare for the government, saying the nation had not witnessed such a
magnitude of system collapse for a long time.
He attributed the situation to natural occurrences such as storms that characterised raining season.
PUNCH
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