His grandfather, Adegoke Adelabu (1915-1958) — aka “Penkelemesi” — dashing hero of Ibadan yokels of pre-1st Republic politics, first coined the term “peculiar mess”, to describe the Nigerian politics of his era.
His grandson, Adebayo Adelabu, sitting Power minister sits and sweats, breathless and harried, in the peculiar mess of contemporary Nigerian electricity.
Indeed, the vanishing dramatics of this critical spark, since he arrived as minister, has made his irate compatriots to, without much ado, dismiss him as the rather unloved “minister of darkness”!
Yet, let no one get ahead of themselves. For one, Nigerians are notoriously short-fused; often spewing rude name-calling, just to push their right to democratic anger.
For another, the power conundrum — as mentioned in a previous column here — is very complex. So, scapegoating the minister and calling for his scalp may be far from grabbing the elixir to crack that conundrum.
Still, even if Minister Adelabu is not on trial, the entire electricity value chain is. Indeed, since the turn of 2024, following the sudden electricity dip in the last two months of 2023, the power sector has been a constant alarming beep: as the most likely legacy-killer for the Bola Tinubu administration.
This bears repeating: without fixing electricity, whatever President Tinubu achieves would not chalk up its full value.
Worse: whereas other segments of critical infrastructure — basically roads and rail — are building on the gains of the Muhammadu Buhari era, power has been regressing, from the modest heights of that era.
Both former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and ace political shaman, Peter Obi, have gone ga-ga over the Lagos-Calabar coastal road, with a rail line in-between.
Atiku wailed and neighed on why the project should start from Lagos, and not from Calabar. Obi has been gnashing his teeth over a project that he claims wipes out jobs — another classical cant, because it is a tribal whoop powered by sweeping over-generalization, masquerading as a national voice that really cares.
Holy Peter should crow that to the nearby marines!
Still, both Atiku and Obi know the game they play only too well. Should that critical coastal highway become reality, birthing an exciting corridor along which Nigerians of all ethnics gleefully drive their personal economies, the margin for election-time deceit becomes painfully tight. That’s Bad News 2027!
Which is why it’s all so refreshing that Dave Umahi, minister of Works, dazzles all the Atiku-Obi jeremiads of doom and desperation with enchanting road spurs, linked to the Lagos-Calabar expressway — the Badagry-Sokoto highway, for instance.
Add the proposed Lagos-Abuja expressway, with shuttle time at six hours maximum — little has been heard on that of late though, prompting the legitimate question of what is happening? — and the prospects of good network of roads nation-wide becomes brighter.
Now, that is Umahi brilliantly building on work done during the Babatunde Fashola ministerial years.
On rail, Uche Diala just lobbed a bomb at South East naysayers, whose dark and wild yammering derided work on the Port Harcourt-Aba narrow-gauge rail; and how Rotimi Amaechi, then Transport minister, shut out the hubbub.
Now, that commercial line just opened. As the exultant denizens out there look forward to daily shuttle on that 62-Km route, Dr. Diala could not resist his “I told you so!” rebuke to doomsday agents, who always put bitter politics over development.
But again, in rail: Said Alkali, current Transport minister, appears busy consolidating on the Amaechi-era works, with a firm promise to firm up the Ibadan-Kano and the Kano-Abuja legs of the Lagos-Kano standard-gauge rail, funds-permitting.
On the power front, however, the picture appears the diametrical opposite. What happens along the value chain — generation, to transmission and finally, distribution — remains nebulous, as the three critical anchors pass the buck at one another.
Still, from the distribution end — the final contact with the market — electricity has badly regressed, compared to the Buhari years.
If you have the fortune to work from home — turned misfortune by DisCos — the day you project to do serious work is same day Ikeja Electric (I.E.) will sap you with blackout all day — with no rime or reason.
That is in the heart of Lagos — and only Eko DisCo customers can tell what happens in that trade zone. Yet, I.E. and Eko DisCo are clearly the best of the DisCos. But their performance is still abysmal.
Two years ago, the present dip in performance was near-distant memory — again, umpteenth warning that progressively failing power could hurt the Tinubu era legacy.
No wonder, this present crunch has thrown up new-fangled “solutions”: bury the distribution companies (DisCos) and move on! But the question is: move on to where?
On DisCos, no tears from here. From their inglorious forebears: NEPA (cynically: Never Expect Power Again) and PHCN (Problem Has Changed Hands), the DisCos had gone ahead to mount own trade notoriety, ranging from that brazen corporate robbery they call estimated billing; and soulless meter racketeering.
Indeed, the greatest failure of the Power sector reforms, since its enabling act of 2005, is that none of the DisCos could boast meters to secure their revenues. How can such outfits then secure the cash from consumers, to routinely pay the generating companies (GenCos), for the not-so-cheap gas that powers their thermal turbines?
Still with all that, DisCos can’t be the most critical problem, though they are closest to the consumer — the ugly shop windows of the skewed electricity mart.
For one, they have absolutely no control over the wares they sell. Thermal GenCos grumble they lack the cash to pay their gas vendors, no thanks to huge debts from electricity market traders. Gas-powered GenCos control 80% of the market, with hydro plants making up the remaining 20%.
So, erratic gas to GenCos, erratic power to DisCos, erratic electricity for consumers.
For another, the core transmission challenge. Though the total installed capacity of power plants — hydro and thermal — is some 16, 384 MW, no more than 4, 000 MW gets wheeled. Even then, the transmission lines of the national grid often collapse.
True, there is ongoing the Siemens work to bolster these high-power lines, run by the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN). But until that is strengthened, and GenCos earn ready cash to pay for gas, this twin, ever-recurring operational glitch, will continue to strip naked the DisCos.
In all the current melee has crept in “federalization”, the supposed new open sesame to breathe instant life into the comatose power market! But on which reinforced technologies are we “federalizing”, with states as new champions?
These then are the stark power issues facing the Tinubu administration, approaching the end of the first quarter, of its four-year tenure. Tough action it must take, even if that means a complete blow-out of the present power sector.
Otherwise, it should brace itself for power — poor power — as its ultimate nemesis.
