With only two years left in the life of President Yar’Adua’s administration, it would be required to give a progress report, especially as it concerns the bid to fix the nation’s power plight which forms the main plank of the President’s much-touted 7-point Agenda.
In this regard searchlight is being beamed on the feasibility of the government’s promise to remarkably boost electricity supply nationwide by increasing power generation to 6, 000 megawatts by year end.
In making that commitment, the president may have considered the place of steady power supply in promoting entrepreneurship and economic growth as well as helping his administration realise its goals in the areas of poverty alleviation, Vision 20-2020 and attaining the millennium development goals. The thinking may also have prompted his bid to tackle the problem head on by proposing the declaration of power emergency as a means of fast-tracking the project.
However, the Yar’Adua administration is yet to show the kind of commitment that would reassure the people that its promises in the direction of solving the nation’s perennial power riddle would not go the way of previous governments.
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In truth, the nation’s epileptic and frustrating power plight has long been a subject of worry even before the beginning of civil rule in 1999 with many previous administrations paying only lip service to Nigeria’s power needs. The situation is so frustrating, that it is almost impossible to have steady power for two straight hours in a single day. To worsen the situation, there are times when there are power outages that go on for several days. This has no doubt brought untold hardship to Nigerians and several businesses, a situation that has for long blunted the competitive edge of the economy of the world’s eighth largest producer of crude oil.
The closure of many businesses, especially various textile companies in the country, high tariff charges by mobile operators in the telecommunication sector, high cost of production by manufacturing companies, and the apathy being displayed by foreign investors who flood other developing countries, have all been linked to the power plight in the country.
It was only under the immediate past Obasanjo administration that Nigerians began to observe concrete efforts in the direction of solving the nation’s power problems. In 2000 Obasanjo raised the hopes of Nigerians with a rather ambitious claim that “by the end of 2001, Nigerians would begin to enjoy regular, uninterrupted power supply”.
He said he was adopting a holistic approach of restructuring the power sector. Along that line, the country’s electricity outfit, PHCN was unbundled into seven generating companies, one transmission company and eleven distribution companies; an arrangement that was targeted at encouraging private sector investment particularly in generation and distribution and pave the way for the entry of independent power producers (IPPs). Even then, not much was achieved in the bid to get the people out of the woods as the Obasanjo rather grandiose power projects eventually became consumed in allegations of corruption as well as accusations and counter accusations of poor execution of the IPP project.
Yar’Adua who succeeded Obasanjo in 2007 came out with a seven-point agenda as the main thrust of his administration which included a strong promise to urgently address the power plight and energy sector. His promise to boost power generation to 6,000 MW by December is the first stage of his government’s phased power plan.
Confusion now reigns as there is no clear guide on how this would be realised even as the decision to throw in more money, while a cloud still hangs on the billions of dollars spent by the previous administration, has not yielded any positive results. So far only 2700 MW is fed into the national grid which marks a signicant drop from the capacity already attained under the Obasanjo administration. And with the on going war in the Niger Delta between the militants and troops of the joint task force and the attendant implication for the already imperilled gas supply to the power stations, there is no doubt that the President’s dream is in danger.
There are concerns that informs the thinking that the government needs to adopt a more proactive approach in its search for solution to the nation’s endemic power problems. It is instructive that two years after it dropped the hint, President Umar Yar”Adua is yet to declare the proposed state of emergency on power. It is also disturbing that the unbundling of PHCN meant to encourage more private sector participation in the sector has been technically reversed without any clear schedule on what is to follow.
Granted that there are intractable challenges like the militancy factor in Niger Delta and its implications for the desired seamless gas supply to power projects, but many Nigerians believe that the government is performing below expectations.
