President Muhammadu Buhari Monday in Abuja challenged stakeholders in
the electricity sector to improve supply to Nigerians, urging them to
reach 7, 000 megawatts by 2021, and work towards 11, 000 megawatts by
2023, while ensuring better distribution to businesses and homes.
The President, who witnessed an agreement signing ceremony with Siemens
AG at the State House, said the priority of his administration remains
to buoy the economy, starting with more improved supply of power that
will create enabling environment for businesses to thrive.
“Our goal is simply to deliver electricity to Nigerian businesses and
homes. My challenge to Siemens, our partner investors in the
Distribution Companies, the Transmission Company of Nigeria and the
Electricity Regulator is to work hard to achieve 7,000 megawatts of
reliable power supply by 2021 and 11,000 megawatts by 2023 – in phases 1
and 2 respectively.
“After these transmission and distribution system bottlenecks have been
fixed, we will seek – in the third and final phase – to drive generation
capacity and overall grid capacity to 25,000 megawatts.
“With our strong commitment to the development of Mambilla Hydroelectric
and the various solar projects under development across the country, the
long-term power generation capacity will ensure adequate energy mix and
sustainability in the appropriate balance between urban and rural
electrification,” he said.
President Buhari told the management team of Siemens led by the Chief
Executive Officer, Mr Joe Kaeser, that electricity remains critical to
the development of Nigeria, noting that the country was blessed with
significant natural gas, hydro and solar resources for power generation
that could be utilized to achieve reliable, affordable and quality
electricity supply necessary for economic growth, industrialization and
poverty alleviation.
“I recall my meeting in late August, last year, with Chancellor Merkel
here in Abuja, when both our Governments committed to future cooperation
to support economic growth and development in Nigeria. We were clear
that fixing the power sector was a key priority for this administration.
“It was during that event that, CEO of Siemens AG, Mr Joe Kaeser,
committed to working with Nigeria to develop a feasible roadmap to
modernise our electricity grid with support from the German
Government,” he added.
The President said previous governments had explored state funded
solutions through the National Independent Power Projects, and they also
explored the installation of large emergency power projects.
“There was also the partial privatization of the power generation and
distribution sectors. These various interventions to solving the
electricity problem have yielded an imbalance between the amount of
power generated and the amount available for consumers.
“Despite over 13,000 megawatts of power generation capacity, only an
average of 4,000 megawatts reliably reaches consumers. Now, we have an
excellent opportunity to address this challenge. This Government’s
priority was to stabilise the power generation and gas supply sector
through the Payment Assurance Facility, which led to a peak power supply
of 5,222 MW,” he noted.
President Buhari said the constraints remained at the transmission and
distribution systems, adding that he had directed a team to ask Siemens
and Nigerian stakeholders to first focus on fixing the transmission and
distribution infrastructure, especially around economic centres where
jobs were created.
In his remarks, the Chief Executive Officer of Siemens AG said the
company would work hard to improve the electricity situation in Nigeria
as the country’s economy will only achieve sustainable development with
adequate power supply.
Mr Kaeser said he would personally supervise the “Implementation
Agreement for the Nigerian Electrification Road map”, which also
involves the German government.