The Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu, has said the country needs $10 billion annually to fix the crisis in the power sector.
The Minister spoke on Tuesday, May 13, at the commissioning ceremony of the phase 1-600kw Solar pv power plant at the Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA), Kaduna.
He said: “For us to achieve functional reliable and stable electricity in Nigeria we need not less than $10 billion annually for the next ten to twenty years. But there are some foundational bottlenecks that we experienced in the past that need to be fixed for the spending of this money to have meaning.
“Number one is the legislative and policy foundation which this administration has achieved by signing the energy bill into an act. This bill has achieved liberation and decentralization of the power sector to enable all levels of government federal State and local government to legally and morally play roles in the power sector to give their citizens at sub national levels. This has given autonomy to more than eleven States and more are still coming.
They can now play roles in the power from generation to transmission to distribution and even metering.
“Secondly, we talk about infrastructure deficit, then we talk about fixing infrastructure deficit which has piled up over the last 60 years due to lack of maintenance, lack of additional investment to revive our transmission grid.”
The Minister also emphasised the need to bridge over 50 per cent metering gap which he said the Presidential initiative aims to achieve through 18 million meter installation in the next five years.
Earlier, while addressing military officers at the NDA, Adelabu said: “I stand before you today at this significant occasion, the commissioning of the 600kW and 3MW Solar PV Power Plant here at the prestigious Nigerian Defence Academy.
“These projects, implemented by the Federal Ministry of Power and the Rural Electrification Agency not only underscores our commitment to improving electrification across key institutions in Nigeria but it is also part of our broader mandate to diversify our energy sources, expand access to clean and reliable electricity…