by Ayo Akinfe
I find it totally unacceptable that none of the presidential candidates has uttered one word about addressing the country’s power crisis
[1] Elections are due in February and nobody has come up with a policy to address the thorny issue of power generation. It says a lot about the quality of our politics. It appears we actually believe that if we elect “good leaders” the problem will suddenly and miraculously go away
[2] Nigeria currently has an embarrassing low installed power capacity of 7,000MW, which should shame all of us. Just to put it into context, these are comparable figures for other developing countries: South Africa – 51,000MW, Pakistan – 21,000MW, Indonesia- 55GW, Vietnam – 42GW, Egypt – 40GW. I can go on and on but the fact remains we are so far behind it is deeply embarrassing. It is naive to think that this can be resolved without doing something dramatic or revolutionary
[3] Egypt opened the world’s three largest power plants recently with a combined 14,400MW capacity. These three stations are expected to supply 45m citizens and save the domestic budget about $1.3bn per year as the result of the subsequent reduction in fuel usage.
[4] China is the largest solar provider in the world with an installed capacity of around 130GW. Solar and wind farms are just springing up everywhere in China now. In fact, connecting generated power to the national grid is now their biggest problem as the majority of that capacity has been added in areas that don’t need it
[5] Known as curtailment, Nigeria also has this problem. Basically, curtailment is when you have stranded power that cannot be hooked up to the national grid. I believe that at least three companies went bust in Nigeria as a result of this
[6] To resolve our problems we basically need a minister of power who is going to dedicate his or her life to this project. Someone prepared to have no life for four years and work on this matter 24/7. So far, Nuhu Ribadu and the late Professor Mrs. Dora Akunyili are the closest we have seen to this. Heads of parastatals who dedicated their lives to the cause
[7] First of all, we need new construction regulations that make it mandatory to install solar panels on all new houses, schools, offices and buildings
[8] We keep building bigger churches and mosques every day. Hmmmm. We need laws that prohibit the building of religious houses unless a solar or wind farm is built alongside it
[9] Businesses must also be given tax relief if they build solar or wind farms. They must be encouraged to use the Atlantic coast to build massive farms. No new business or factory should be given a license unless it plans to generate at least 10MW of power
[10] We then need a minister of state for distribution who will make transmission his or her life cause. Getting those distribution companies working is a totally new challenge. They need investment and equipment. This is no small challenge, ladies and gentlemen. Phew!
Ayo is a London-based journalist who has worked as a magazine and newspaper editor for the last 31 years. He was the founding editor of Nigerian Watch, the UK-based paper for the Nigerian community in the UK.
He is the current president of Ondo Union UK, the chair of Uncelebrated Nigerian Awards UK and was the chairman of the Nigerian Centenary Awards UK organising committee. He was recently appointed as the Chairman of the Central Association of Nigerians in the UK
He is also the author of two books on Nigeria. Fuelling the Delta Fires is an expose which reveals the depth of the challenges in the Niger Delta, while Black Ladder is a narrative about the life of a Nigerian immigrant in the UK. In addition, Ayo is a columnist for several publishing houses in both Nigeria and the UK.
Ayo has a history degree from the University of Ibadan and he did his post-graduate studies in journalism at the University of Westminster.
