Along with many others, I awaited the publication of the Government’s Action Plan, Roadmap Plan on Power, setting out its plans for the future shape of electricity generation and supply industry in Nigeria with a mixture of interest and trepidation. Few, really, who can see or discern where all this is leading can, take much comfort from its proposals. The Roadmap Plan document makes pretty dismal reading for anyone with an interest in, or concern over the issue of the future energy supplies at a reasonable cost to the nation,
especially in terms of its proposals for electricity generation and outright privatisation of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN), without first laying a firm foundation for the exercise to succeed and this will worsen matters.
Actually, there are three separate, main issues that need to be addressed. First, the issues of existing consumers who account for about 36% of Nigeria’s population currently connected to the national grid but are not receiving regular electricity supply. Second, the issue of expanding the power facilities in the country to accommodate more new consumers. There is presently an annual demand growth rate of 6% for electricity in the country. Third, the issue of privatising all of the eleven(11) distribution companies and six(6) generation companies, while the Federal Government retains the ownership of the transmission company, that is, the national grid company. It is in the light of these issues, I shall critically examine what the Roadmap Plan offers.
The Roadmap Plan is bereft of new ideas on how to tackle the incessant power supply problem in the country, to provide steady electricity supply nationwide, within a short-time frame; which is really what the existing electricity consumers in the country desperately need and deserved, without unnecessarily, the trouble of having to wait until the year 2012, before they could hopefully enjoy reliable power supply promised by the Government.
The Government has managed to come-up with a plan that offers no real solution to the actual electricity problem in the country, that is, to the erratic power supply, but rather one that would further compound the already bad power situation in a matter of time.
The current Government approach to the electricity problem which is mainly based on spending huge sums of money to create massive power infrastructure than necessary to meet our country’s power requirements between now and the year 2020, and to sell-off electricity is not new.
This was the same approach the Obasanjo government applied to attempt to solve the electricity problem, over a period of eight years, from 1999 to 2007, but to no avail. In fact, despite concerted efforts, the Obasanjo government failed to complete any of its planned new 17 power stations, with their associated transmission and distribution networks, which were expected to contribute 10,000MW to the existing national grid under the so called National Integrated Power Project (NIPP) scheme, during its eight year tenure. This massive power infrastructure, on which the country has expended huge sums of money running into several trillions of naira (over 36 billion US dollars), is lying fallow. This tied-up huge resources of the country for over eleven years now, without any benefit to the nation.
It would be a huge mistake for the Jonathan government, with the benefit of hindsight, to repeat the same wrong approach to the electricity problem as its predecessors in office, albeit at a slightly modified form and on a much larger scale than previously.
Can’t the government propose differently, not for further squandering the scarce resources of our country, but to come-up with a better and completely new approach to the electricity problem that will ensure effective solution, and keep the wastage of resources to a bare minimum? Anyone can waste other people’s money on over insurance, but the hall mark of a man’s professional competence is in his ability to provide solution to a problem with limited resources and of course, cost and to ensure that waste is reduced to a minimum. On this score, in my opinion, the Roadmap Plan on Power is hardly a good model for solving the electricity crisis, with its potential for creating enormous white elephants project. In this endeavor, there is no way the government can achieve any better results than its predecessors. This will end-up in a fiasco.
There are already signs in the country that things are moving in that direction, as the rainy season gives way to dry season, the electricity supply in the country is once again faltering, betraying the fact that no improvement was achieved in the power sector in the past eleven years, despite the huge financial resources being spent in the sector. I have dealt with this matter extensively in my article,’ President Yar’adua and Electricity debacle’, published in Daily Trust Monday, April 20, 2009, Guest Columnist back page.
Certainly, it will take more than 10 years for the Government to be able to complete the construction of the new massive power infrastructure project which it now intends to build for the country, in addition to completing the uncompleted NIPP power project of its predecessors’ (assuming that the Jonathan Government is re-elected into office in the year 2011).
The question is why the Government should embark on such a gigantic power project, that is, highly unlikely to contribute much to solving the actual problems bedeviling the electricity industry in Nigeria.
Contrary to popular belief, the country really doesn’t need such a massive electricity project to be able to meet its electricity requirements between now and the year 2020, which is just ten years away from now. The country’s existing power infrastructure is quite adequate to provide reliable power supply nationwide, well into the year 2020, if properly managed and optimised, as I pointed out in my article under review. So, why shouldn’t the Jonathan government concentrate its energy to achieving this, instead of wasting time and money in a project that will not add much value to solving the electricity problem?
Government should note that capital investment is not a source of efficiency and effectiveness and this cannot solve the power failure problem, that is, the problem of electricity supply in the country; which is basically the inability of the PHCN to establish and maintain a reliable supply of electricity even though the installed generating capacity (5906MW) is a multiple of that needed to serve actual peak demand (2470MW). This problem can only be tackled through good management of the existing resources of the PHCN; which the government seemed to overlook. Furthermore, the government should ensure that the expansion of the new power facilities in the country are carried-out in a systematic manner, in line with our country’s electricity requirement or need, that is, to meet the load forecast demand over a specified development planning period, say every five years and not more. This is what is lacking in the electricity industry. Clearly, this is the root cause of all the failures of the past attempts in tackling the electricity crisis. Successive governments in the country (including this one) disregarded this critical issue. Instead of addressing this issue squarely, to the advantage of the country, without which no progress can be made in the provision of reliable power supply, they, however, simply opted to throw more huge financial resources into the power sector than needed to deal with the actual power failure problem and thereby, compounded the situation, resulting in the monumental waste of resources.
Government should please also note that rising the country’s generating capacity to 20,000MW by the year 2014, per se, is not sufficient condition to provide reliable power supply nationwide. There are other far more important factors that needed to be taken into account, which the government has overlooked, that can establish and sustain reliable electricity supply nationwide even at the present country’s generating capacity. In other words, the availability of steady electricity is not so much dependent on the size of the generating capacity; a view erroneously held in the government circles. Thus, no matter how big the generating capacity in the country is raised to, if these factors are not put in place, the problem of erratic power supply will persist.
Another major problem the government got wrong was the projection on the financial cost implications needed to fix the electricity problem. It is patently untrue to say that “Nigeria needs N 6 trillion to meet its power demand between now and the year 2020”. This assumption was based on wrong information and analysis of what would be required to tackle the electricity problem rather than on factual data and knowledge of the actual problems bedeviling the power sector.
In other words, the given figure was based on artificial jerks-up, which should not be taken as the basis for any serious decision- making in a commercial venture. There is no reason why one cannot provide reliable power supply nationwide for a fraction of the expenditure of the said amount, if the right approach is made. So much for this, or is the government making a case for the privatisation of the power sector?
Dr. Kasim Buba Muhammad, former Policy Adviser/ Analyst and member of the defunct Independent Policy Group (IPG), wrote from No. 20, Shettima Ali Monguno, St, Old G.R.A Maiduguri, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
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