Electricity generation falls to record low

Electricity generation and distribution fell to a record low on Tuesday, hitting its lowest point since President Muhammadu Buhari took power in May 2015.

The week before Buhari took power in May 2015, power generation fell to a record low of 1,327 megawatts (MW) amid a national black out and biting fuel scarcity.

On March 1, 2016, power generation fell to a record nine-month low, landing at 2,800MW.

However, the latest figures from the daily report of the Nigerian System Operations (NESO), a department of the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), has shown that power fell to 1580.6MW on Wednesday.

NESO revealed that Ikeja distribution company (DISCO) got 237.09MW, Abuja had 181.77MW, Eko had a share of 173.87MW, while Benin, Ibadan and Jos got 142.25MW and 205.48MW 86.93MW respectively.

Kano, Port Harcourt and Yola also got 126.45MW, 102.74MW and 55.32MW respectively.

This is coming a month after the controversial increase in electricity tariff against a standing court order.

Femi Adesina, special adviser to the president on media and publicity, said Nigerians are the ones sabotaging the efforts of the government.

“On the issue of power, it seems Nigerians are their own problems. You can recall about four weeks ago, the power ministry came out to say that the megawatts we had was 5070, which is an all-time high in 16 years,” he had said.

“A few days after, some people blew installations in Bayelsa; we lost about 1600 megawatts immediately. After that, installation was blown in Delta and we lost another 1,000 megawatts. What would the government do in that kind of circumstance?

“If the people who should be provided power are the ones sabotaging installations, they can’t turn round to say government is not providing power. Nigerians need to determine what they want.

“If South Africa has about 50,000 megawatts, it is because their own people are not sabotaging their installations, they are not going to blow up the lines. If Nigerians continue to blow up and sabotage, then they can’t come around to say that there is no power.”