To begin with, it is sad to note that, as a country we do not have “sufficient” Electricity generation, transmission, and distribution capacity even for “domestic” uses let alone for “Industrialization”.The United States of America with a population of about 390million generates 1,143,757 megawatts; South Africa with a population of about 59 million people generates 58,095 megawatts; Saudi Arabia with a population of about 35 million people generates 83,036 megawatts; and Nigeria with a population of over 200 million people only at peak generates about 7,421 megawatts without a corresponding capacites for transmission, and distribution.
Permit me to call on our new governors -elect and the second term governors of the 36 states of the federation to take “advantage” of the new constitutional amendment on Electricity matters by attracting both “public” and “private” investments to their Electricity sectors of their respective states in order to transform their economies. Stable power supply is a necessary get way to Industrialization. Industrialization is a means for unemployment and poverty reductions in the society. On the other hand, Unemployment and poverty reductions are very vital for achieving peace, stability, and low crimes rates in the society.
Before the new “amendment”, Electricity matter is in the Exclusive Legislative List (Federal powers). Thanks to the 9th National Assembly (the Senate and the House Representatives), the 36 states Houses of Assembly and President Muhammadu Buhari for “passing” and “assenting” the “bill” into “law” which has now removed the issue of “Electricity”from the Exclusive Legislative List (Federal powers) to the Concurrent Legislative List(shared powers among the tiers of government). There are several matters in the Nigerian constitution that needed to be moved from the “Exclusive” to “Concurrent” Legislative Lists which, in my view, both the in-coming Executive and Legislature need to look at and do the needful.
One of the major “bane” of our federation is the over “concentration” of “power” to the federal government in many aspects of our lives unlike in other federations where powers are largely devolved among the various tiers of governments. This is why many analysts concluded that we are only a federation in “theory”, but largely unitary in “practice”. No thanks to our long stay of military governments in power which in my thought is largely responsible for our highly centralized federation.
The new “law” unlike in the “pass” now allows “states” to generate,transmit and distribute Electricity to their respective states for their own needs through state Grid. We already have some states that were able to built power plants for power generation a long time ago, but those states could not solve the power supply needs of their states. The power generated is often sold to the National Grid, but with the new law, a state could own its own state Grid for the benefits of its people.
Power sector in Nigeria has three cycles:(1) Generating Companies (GENCOS),(2) Transmission Company of Nigeria(TCN) ,and (3) Distribution Companies (DISCOS). Each of the cycles largely depends on one another for the proper functioning of the system. If the generating companies generate the power, the power must be transmitted before the distribution companies could supply to the final or end users. The DISCOS will only supply to the final users what they receive from the transmission company and the transmission company will only transmit what they get from the GENCOS. Although in our case, there is issue of capacity from generation, transmission to distribution. As low as our generation capacity it is even higher than our transmission capacity. Our transmission capacity, on the other hand, as poor as it is, is even better than the distribution capacity. We have had enough issues of the DISCOS rejecting supply due to their poor capacity as well as management.
However, the reality is that we have the “misfortune”of power sector “privatization” to alleged”politicians” rather than to “businessmen” with proven “technical” and “financial” wherewithal. Information having it that the “agreement” on power sector privatization was for the new owners to make huge “Investments” in the sector in order to witness tremendous improvement in the sector, but since the privatization was to allege “politicians” the “agreement”, in my thought, was death on arrival. The sad reality is that ten(10) years after the much needed Investments in the power sector is yet to come. There is the issue of bail- out to the private “owners” in order to make the “required” Investments in the power sector which has not given any reasonable results so far.
Some people have opined that the power sector privatization should be “revoked” since the new owners have not made the required investments in the sector. In my thought, there will hardly be a government that will “reverse” or “revoke” the power sector privatization because by the privatization the government had a huge revenue burden “relief” of the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria inform of monthly “personnel burden”, monthly “pension burden” and “Overhead cost burden” running into billions of naira in its annual budget. The power sector privatization had succeeded in taking the said burden off government annual budget.
The new law presents an opportunity for serious and determine individual states to be self- sufficient in Electricity sector. Let individual states take advantage of this new law for their developments.
May God bless Nigeria!
