Last week’s collapse of the national electricity grid which is the third time in less than a month, resurrected talks about poor electricity infrastructure across the country and the reality of what Nigerians face on a daily basis in their struggle to have access to what should be a basic amenity for driving socioeconomic activities.

The national grid collapse which occurred on Tuesday, 19 September, came barely five days after the grid collapsed twice within a space of about 12 hours. It dropped from a peak of 3,594.60 megawatts (MW) at midnight to a meagre 42.7mw at 12 noon.

The Transition Company of Nigeria (TCN) had in a statement by its General Manager, Public Affairs, Ndidi Mbah, on 14 September 2023, blamed the grid collapse on a fire incident on Kainji/Jebba 330KV Line 2, adding that the incident is being investigated, with “the view to forestalling future occurrence and invariably further strengthening the grid.” Before then, the TCN had celebrated over 421 days of consistent grid stability.

However, the TCN could not offer an explanation for the subsequent grid collapses.

In 2022, the grid collapsed seven times, with the Federal Government promising to end it.

The latest, no doubt, plunged many Nigerian homes and businesses into total blackout.

The Electricity crisis has been a perennial problem in the country. With over 200 million population, Nigeria rarely boasts of 5000 megawatts (MW) of power successfully generated, transmitted, and distributed since the advent of grid electricity in the country to date.

Despite the unbundling and privatisation of the power sector in Nigeria, not much improvement has been achieved thus leaving a majority of the citizens to resort to alternative energy sources which are most times considered unsafe.

Grid collapses despite funding interventions for transmission infrastructure improvement Nigeria has spent billions of dollars, secured through loans, on funding the transmission infrastructure but keeps experiencing collapses of the national grid.

During the administration of the immediate past President, Muhammadu Buhari, Nigeria secured about $7.5 billion loans to boost transmission infrastructure. The loans were obtained from multilateral institutions such as the World Bank, the African Development Bank (AfDB), the government of Japan, and the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), among others.

https://www.primebusiness.africa/power-nigerians-in-dilemma-of-national-grid-collapse-and-high-fuel-cost/