Nigeria’s Minister for Power Adebayo Adelabu has expressed frustration over the persistent power cuts in the country and blamed the unfortunate situation on sabotage by a section of the citizenry.
Addressing the media on the happenings in the power sector in Nigeria, Mr. Adelabu emphasised that investigations conducted showed that a group of unscrupulous people in the country have consistently been sabotaging the power distribution system, making the electricity supply unstable.
“Something happened which never happens anywhere in the world, which is a deliberate destruction of our collection assets. Since I assumed office, I have witnessed not less than eight deliberate destruction of our transmission power lines. People will deliberately break transmission lines, you go back to fix it but before you leave, it happens again. Just yesterday, it happened again in Nasarawa,” he attested.
He said power and transmission line theft among other crimes occurred consistently since he assumed office, warning that the security agencies, power sector players and the citizens must team up to expose criminals in the sector so that it would trigger efficiency in the power distribution chain.
“I’m saying this confidently that they are joking. We are not intimidated. We are not scared. We will confront them. We’ve started investigations and we have spoken to the NSA to provide security for these power installations,” Minister…… said.
Mr Adelabu observed that some people do not want the sector to work.
“We can’t build something for some people to destroy it. So anywhere you have major demolishing or destruction of the power lines, it will lead to grid collapse. Some people went in to sabotage and we need to fight it collectively,” he opined.
Sadly, he stated that unless the Federal Government stepped up to intensify monitoring, the unscrupulous Nigerians would continuously frustrate efficient and effective operations in the sector, which also impacts negatively on the socio-economic development of the nation.
According to him, it costs about US$30 million to US$50 million to build a 330KV sub-station only for some bad nuts to destroy them.
Minister Adelabu stated that the country needed to change obsolete electrical equipment such as transformers and transmitters for which they have contacted two Chinese companies to compare costs and choose the one with the best but least cost to start work.
Source: https://energynewsafrica.com