Category: Editorial

• It’s high time these were minimised, especially by an outgoing government

The Federal Government appears to be between the apocryphal devil and the deep blue sea, with regards to its dependency on borrowings to fund its 2023 budget deficit, standing at N10.78 trillion out of total budget of N21.82 trillion. Senate President Ahmad Lawan’s admonition on further borrowings showcases this despondency. In one breath, he advised the Federal Government to stop further borrowing, while in another, he acknowledges that the borrowings help government execute its projects. In his words: “For those of my colleagues who will be returning to the National Assembly, this should be a very important matter for the next assembly to continue to deal with because we just cannot afford to continue  borrowing.”

He went on to say: “we should minimise it. I know it is not possible to eliminate it completely, but we should minimise it.” Again he said: “The next assembly should do that. I don’t know how, but definitely, from our experience of today and even before today, we can do better in getting more revenues for government to deploy for development.” The apparent confusion on how to deal with the burgeoning nation’s total debt stock put at N44.06 trillion as at the third quarter (Q3) of last year by the Debt Management Office is a cause for worry.

For us, the only option is for the Federal Government to stop further borrowings, or to minimise borrowing to the barest minimum, since the tenure of the present political actors will end by May 29. As rightly advised by the senate president at the occasion marking his 64th birthday in Abuja, since the current administration is running out of time, the incoming administration should be left to determine whether to keep borrowing or look internally to solve the fiscal challenges of the federal and state governments.

Senator Lawan advised: “I think we have to work hard to improve our revenue generation and collection because it is not looking too sustainable that we tolerate people and some agencies of government, to misapply or not even declare the revenues they collect. We can’t continue with that.” We hope the next National Assembly will enact robust laws to deal ruthlessly with such misapplication of internally generated revenue, as the nation must look inward to heal the nation’s economy.

Speaking on the way forward, Mr Lawan promised that in its remaining days the senate “will continue to engage with our revenue-generating agencies until we get better outcomes from them.” Also of paramount importance is strengthening the tax net. It is abnormal that only employees in the formal sector pay taxes, while majority of Nigerians in the informal sector don’t pay. According to reliable statistics, the tax-to-GDP ratio for many African countries from 2010 to 2020 increased from 14.4% to 16.0% in 2020, while that of Nigeria decreased from 7.35% to 5.5% in the same period.

According to the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, Nigeria’s tax-to-GDP is the lowest in the world. Even those in the private sector who pay tax, usually underpay, because the tax agencies are ill-equipped to effectively assess and collect appropriate taxes. We also agree with Mr Lawan that government should review the various tax concessions and waivers that have been given by government, so that those that cannot be justified are cancelled. It is common knowledge that self-serving motives drive the grant of some of such waivers, and there are instances where  expired waivers remain in use to undermine revenue payments.

In the light of the serious concerns of the senate on excessive borrowings, how would the senate handle the recent request of the Federal Government to restructure the N23.7 trillion Ways and Means facility advanced the Federal Government by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in the last 10 years? When the president’s letter requesting securitisation of the fund was read in the senate, there was an uproar, as some senators contended that the request was unconstitutional, while others demanded for documents to back up the request.

To compound the matter, President Muhammadu Buhari has said that unless the approval is granted by the senate, the nation will suffer some losses. While interacting with the senate leadership, the president warned that the country would have to pay an extra $4 billion to service its debt, and spend about N1.8 trillion in additional interest in 2023. While the president’s prognosis is worrisome, the senate must insist on getting the relevant documentation from the Central Bank and the Ministry of Finance, before giving the required approval.

It would amount to dereliction of duty to approve securitisation of such humongous expenditure, without legislative oversight. We therefore support the summons extended to the CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele and the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, to appear before the ad hoc committee of the senate with documents to justify the expenditure.

While we acknowledge substantial infrastructure gains from some borrowings by the Buhari government, we urge the regime to halt further borrowings in its twilight.

•Whether Premier Hotel rebrands or hits a final stop depends on its owners’ choices

Premier Hotel, Ibadan, is one of three regional “siblings” — the other two: Hamdala Hotel, Kaduna and Hotel Presidential, Enugu.  

These three hotels hall-marked the socio-economic vision of the emergent governing elite of the early independence years: their healthy regional competitiveness; and their canon of development agencies to push investments and drive the economies of their respective regions.

Premier Hotel opened shop in 1966, legacy of the old Western Region.  Hamdala Hotel, owned by the Northern Region, opened in 1961.  Hotel Presidential, Enugu, an Eastern Region investment, opened around that same era.

Of the three, only Hamdala still grinds out business from its harsh environment, itself also probably worse for wear.  Premier Hotel shut down — for reported “renovation and rebranding” — on December 28, 2022, with all its service staff laid off and paid off.  

Hotel Presidential, Enugu, has become a glorified bush, no thanks to a lingering legal tussle that has thrown off its concessionaire, which had the mandate to re-model, re-develop, re-brand and re-launch, and — had that arrangement stood — run it for 35 years before re-negotiating the hotel’s future.

Though Hamdala Hotel still runs — and with it the weight of northern economic history and the majesty of Arewa culture — it would be interesting to know how its business model is coping with newer and more nimble competition; or with the thrust of foreign hotel brands and franchises, nibbling for new opportunities in the Nigerian hospitality market.  But at least, it still hangs in there — for how long, no one is sure.

Premier Hotel lost that bragging right last December.  This lodger review from July 2017, headlined  ”Shockingly poor” by one Fabsibear from Canberra, Australia, shows why: 

“This is by any standard a decrepit and bizarre hotel.  No hot water in my room, shower handle broken, Internet not working, strange bedding, the list goes on.  The ‘restaurant’ is dismal and utterly depressing.  No signs to the dining area, just go down some dark stairs into an area with broken doors and abandoned stalls.  The staff at the front counter were insolent and disorganised, at least some of the others like at the bar and restaurants were nicer, though evidently untrained.

“A really depressing atmosphere throughout the hotel, has the feeling of an abandoned building.  To top it off, the rates they demand are completely absurd — guests shouldn’t even be paying  a fraction of what they charge.  Isolated location.”

A grim report, to be sure, though there were also more sympathetic and sentimental ones.  But its summary shows how the hotel’s business model had collapsed over the years: decrepit structure, indifferent service, discourteous staff and little training to hone the service skills of the more tolerable staff.

Hotel and hospitality is all about service — service the eye cannot see but which the client acutely feels.  If the service is sub-par, there is neither return visit nor peer recommendation.

That dries up the cash — which robs the physical structure of repairs and routine maintenance.  It also shrinks the hotel’s power to hire the best of minds to beat competition, not to talk of paying well to maintain present staff.  That clearly has been the bane of Premier Hotel, despite perching on Mokola Hill, which commands a picturesque and majestic view over Ibadan.

But it is good the hotel owners have located the fault and have decided to halt the drift.  They also seem to be hitting on the right corrective recipes: re-develop, re-brand and re-train staff, even if that means partnering foreign hotel brands and franchises.

Adewale Raji, group managing director of Odu’a Investments Limited, the hotel investors, volunteered: “In line with our plans to make our hotels world-class, we are renovating Premier Hotel and upgrading its facilities to make it a five-star hotel, in collaboration with a global brand chosen by the board with the help of KMPG and approval of the shareholders.”

This is a bold step.  Still, three- or five-star hotel is neither here nor there, except in the scale of business and calibre of expected clientele, private or corporate.  Though a five-star hotel will logically translate to more cash, a well-run three-star hotel will comfortably garner its fair share of business, and set itself up for a logical upgrade.

So, instead of fixation with “five-star hotel”, the owners should push the foreign brand to help birth a new service culture; and also recruit and train new staff, aside from retraining old ones.  That should drive its new vision.

With Premier Hotel mirrors Yoruba history and political development, as Hamdala Hotel does of the North.  All these factors can only help to market and push the new brand, if it’s well conceived and superbly delivered.

Before arriving its present brand name of Eko Hotels & Suites, the far younger Eko Hotel (opened 1977), formerly fully owned by the Lagos State Government, had gone through its own rites of passage and serial rebranding: Eko Hotel; Eko Hotel Accor; Eko Le Meridien Hotel; and now Eko Hotels & Suites, with which it now trades, delivers value to patrons, and dividends to investors.

Premier Hotel can come back better and stronger, if its commercial rite of passage is right.  But that depends on the choice of its owners.  They can’t afford to fail.  The glorious legacy of the Western Region depends on their success.

•This is only panacea to importation of fuel and attendant subsidy fraud

Obviously determined to bring a decisive end to the age-long spectre of seasonal fuel scarcity, the endless queues of vehicles at petrol stations and the attendant frequent informal hike in price of fuel by oil marketers, the Federal Government has reportedly invested in four private refineries to boost domestic production as well as availability of the product – Premium Motor Spirit (PMS). The latest round of fuel scarcity, which began early in December, last year, lingers, with long queues in several petrol stations in Abuja and Lagos, among others, and those stations selling the product doing so at exorbitant prices. Speaking with media correspondents in Abuja, the Minister of State for Petroleum, Mr. Timipre Sylva, said this initiative is part of plans by government to enhance Nigeria’s energy security.

The four private refineries in which the Federal Government has equity stakes ranging from 20 to 30 percent are Duport Refinery based in Edo State, with a capacity of 2,500 barrels per day (30%), Imo State-based Walter Smith Refineries with a 5,000 barrels per day capacity (30%), Azikel Refinery located in Bayelsa State, with a 12,500 barrels per day capacity (20%) and the ongoing Dangote Refinery based in Lagos, with a capacity of 600,000 barrels per day (20%). To complement these, the minister also disclosed that the Port Harcourt Refinery, which has been undergoing Turn Around Maintenance (TAM) since 2021 will become operational by the 1st quarter of this year.

In August 2021, the Federal Executive Council (FEC) approved the sum of $1.48 billion for the rehabilitation of both the Kaduna and Warri refineries. According to the Managing Director of the Warri Refining and Petrochemical Company (WRPC), Desmond Inyama, the refinery is expected to resume operations by December, this year. In the same vein, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Ltd (NNPCL) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with a South Korean conglomerate to rehabilitate the Kaduna Refinery.

Many Nigerians are understandably skeptical about the TAM of the four public refineries bearing any useful fruit. This is because most of such exercises undertaken in the past ended up being monumental wastes.

However, we must give the government the benefit of the doubt when it asserts that the story will be different this time around and that the scope of work currently being done on the four public refineries goes far beyond what was the case with such exercises in the past.  The minister is optimistic that with the collective production of the Port Harcourt refineries, Dangote refineries and the modular refineries, the era of importation of petroleum products will be put behind us. We can only be hopeful that this optimism is not misplaced. The Warri, Kaduna and Port Harcourt refineries have a joint capacity of 445,000 barrels per day. If these are systematically brought on stream as being planned, along with the private refineries, with marked improvement in domestic production, then it will become meaningful to talk of removal of current oil subsidy as the minister said.

According to Mr. Sylva, “The profitability of refineries under a subsidy regime will be difficult as the money spent on subsidy can be deployed to other developmental projects like refinery development and also increased funds for the government. Let us remove subsidy so that the government will have more money to deploy to the things that will be useful to all of us as a country”. Since the whole subsidy regime and the large scale fraud widely believed to be inherent in it arise primarily from our dependence on export of crude oil and importation of refined products, boosting domestic productivity as is being attempted to do now is critical to eliminating subsidy removal.

We understand the security implications in the oil industry as well as the capital intensive nature of investments that necessitate the government taking out minority equity stakes in private refineries. This is certainly the way to go as demonstrated by the remarkable success of the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas Company (NLNG) in which the government has minority shares. This makes it possible for stakeholders to run the company and take decisions based on economic rationality rather than extra-business considerations. However, we urge the NNPCL to focus more on strengthening the regulatory framework within which private sector companies in the sector operate rather than inserting itself in the market process as an operator.

Mr. Sylva said, for instance, that while the Dangote Refinery already has an established contract with NNPCL, in terms of crude oil supply, modular refineries usually access crude oil from private assets closer to them. In his words, “The modular refineries have crude oil supply contract with private sector owners of these assets that are near them”. This does not suggest the absence of a level-playing ground on a terrain in which the market and demand and supply forces should be key determinants of actors’ operations.

•Abuse of ransom payments calls for collaboration with security agents

There is apparently no base line to the moral turpitude into which contemporary Nigerian society has fallen. A supposed pastor staged his own kidnap twice last year to extort N.6million ransom from his church members, according to the police in Plateau State presently holding the suspect in custody. This comes against the backdrop of other shocking incidents, like a son in Kwara State who masterminded his father’s kidnap and collected N2.5million ransom before his release.

The Plateau State Police Command said Albarka Sukuya of Jenta Apata, in Jos, had been apprehended for criminal conspiracy, self-kidnapping and mischief. According to the command, Sukuya worked alongside other members of his gang to fake his own kidnap, upon which concerned members of his church contributed money to pay his ransom. Before his arrest, the suspect also allegedly orchestrated a fire incident at the premises of ECWA Bishara 3 Church, Jenta Apata, where cars belonging to his fellow pastors were set ablaze. He reportedly claimed that one of them, a senior pastor, hates him.

In a statement last week, the command’s spokesman, Alfred Alabo, a Deputy Superintendent of Police, said the command “uncovered nefarious acts of one Pastor Albarka Bitrus Sukuya of Jenta Apata, Jos, who on several occasions staged his kidnap with his cohorts and received ransom from sympathising members of his congregation.” Alabo stated: “Sequel to his spurious kidnaps on 14/11/2022 and 30/11/2022 where N400,000 and N200,000 were respectively paid by his sympathisers as ransom for his release, the incidents triggered suspicion.

“Through credible intelligence, the clergyman was invited by the DPO Nassarawa Gwong Police Station, CSP Musa Hassan, and investigation commenced immediately. In the course of the investigation, it was established that the suspect has been conspiring with his gang to stage his kidnap and fraudulently collecting the ransom. On interrogation, the suspect confessed to having committed the crime… The suspect further disclosed that on 04/01/2023, he set ablaze two vehicles (a Mercedes Benz and a Toyota) and a bicycle parked on ECWA Bishara 3, Jenta Apata premises belonging to his colleagues – one of whom he alleged hates him, referring to his senior pastor.”

On the back of the news about the self-kidnapper, there was another report about kidnappers in Osun State who seized three members of a church in Iwo sent to deliver ransom payment for the release of two fellow members earlier abducted. Besides taking the N6million that the three were bringing as payment, the kidnappers held on to all the victims and demanded fresh N24million ransom.

According to reports, the two abductees earlier seized were kidnapped while returning from their farms in Ileogbo area of Osun State. Following that abduction penultimate Wednesday, the kidnappers contacted family members and demanded N10million ransom, which was negotiated down to N6million. The ransom was to be delivered at a border area with Kogi State, and it was en route to the agreed point the kidnappers seized the ransom bearers with the money, demanding fresh ransom to let all five victims off. The police in Osun State confirmed the incident, and reports this week indicated some of the abductees had regained their freedom.

These incidents illustrate the moral tangle the menace of kidnapping has foisted on our society. If proven guilty, Sukuya is one pastor from hell. He not only failed to set a good moral example as expected of a professing spiritual leader, he unkindly exploited the love and trust of his church members who rallied to raise ransom money for his release from purported kidnappers. Such heartless abuse of trust could only make it difficult for genuine victims of abductions to get help and elicit swift remedial action from security agents, because if a ‘pastor’ fakes kidnap, who then can be taken at face value?

The flip side is the need for relations of kidnap victims to exercise caution in rushing ransom money over to kidnappers. The keen concern for the safety of victims can’t be faulted, of course. But it might help if security agents are taken into confidence in dealing ransom payment so that this isn’t abused like Sukuya is alleged to have done, or further exploited like the Osun kidnappers did. But the security services have the onus to win the confidence of embattled relations of  kidnap victims and not further endanger the victims’ safety in the way they undertake rescue plans. Nigeria is deeply mired by the kidnap menace and security operators must earn the confidence of citizens in tackling down the menace.

•We congratulate the diplomat and hope that Nigeria regains her glory in the comity of nations

Nothing perhaps demonstrated his worth as a diplomat and the respect he enjoyed internationally more than his unproblematic return to the position of Deputy Secretary-General of the Commonwealth after a military coup ended his role as Nigeria’s foreign minister, after about three months, under the President Shehu Shagari civilian administration in 1983.

Not only did the Commonwealth heads of government unanimously support his return to that office, they went on to elect him as the third Commonwealth Secretary-General in 1989, and reelected him for another term.

Chief Emeka Anyaoku’s period as the head of the Commonwealth Secretariat from July 1990 to March 2000 was not only a personal achievement but also created a situation in which his country basked in his reflected glory. His era coincided with a difficult period of military rule in Nigeria, but that reality did not detract from his stature as a distinguished diplomat.

When he turned 90 on January 18, his observations showed that the country is in need of redemption. He  lamented at his birthday celebration in Lagos: “An undeniable truth at the moment is that our country has declined, insecurity has made travelling by road dangerous.

”The green passport is disdained in many international airports. Our economy is such that most of our young people and increasingly a great number of our professionals are going abroad for greener pastures.

“Nigeria now has one of the greatest concentrations of people living below the poverty line.”

His intervention in the country’s affairs reflects his relevance. He notably served under three democratically elected Presidents in Nigeria as Chairman of the Presidential Advisory Council on International Relations from 2000 to 2015.

Born in Obosi, in present-day Anambra State, Anyaoku studied at the University College, Ibadan, which was then under the University of London, as a college scholar. He got a degree in Classics in 1959.

A member of the pioneering generation of Nigerian foreign service officers, he joined the diplomatic service in 1962, and was posted to Nigeria’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York the following year. He joined the Commonwealth Secretariat as Assistant Director of International Affairs in 1966, and became Deputy Secretary-General in 1977.

As Secretary-General, he focused on strengthening intra-Commonwealth relations and promoting democracy and good governance. He introduced the use of Commonwealth observer groups to monitor elections in various countries, which helped to lessen post-election conflicts. He sent 51 election observer groups to various Commonwealth countries.

He defended democracy when Gen. Ibrahim Babangida’s military regime unjustifiably annulled Nigeria’s historic presidential election of June 12, 1993. In an official statement, he described the annulment as a “severe setback to the cause of democracy, particularly at a time when all Commonwealth governments have pledged themselves to promote democratic rule in their countries. “

Also, he was in office when Nigeria was suspended from the Commonwealth in November 1995, following the execution of nine human rights campaigners based on murder-related accusations, including the environmental activist, Ken Saro-Wiwa, under the Gen. Sani Abacha military dictatorship.

In both cases, he stood for civilised conduct. It is significant that, in 1997, he organised the first African Commonwealth Heads of Government Roundtable to discuss democracy and good governance on the continent.

His retirement after an impressive diplomatic career prompted the University of London to establish a chair in his honour at its Institute of Commonwealth Studies, the Emeka Anyaoku Professor of Commonwealth Studies. Also, he was invited to be a Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Global Governance, London School of Economics (2000 – 2002).

His Nigerian national honours, Commander of the Order of the Federal Republic (CFR) and Commander of the Order of the Niger (CON), underline his service to the benefit of the country. He also received the Royal Victorian Order from the Queen of England in 2000.

Known for his urbaneness and integrity, Anyaoku said “90 is an age of reflection,” and hopes the country will “change for the better.” We hope so too, and congratulate him as he enters his nonagenarian years.

• Ex-TCN boss points the way forward in the beleaguered power sector

Scary, if you ask us. That is the takeaway from the interview granted on Trust TV’s ’30 Minutes’ by a former Managing Director of the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), Dr. Usman Gur Mohammad. Mohammad shared his views on the country’s power sector  in relation to his participation in the PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) engagement that interrogated the four leading presidential candidates on how they hope to resolve the country’s power logjam, if elected. The parties are the All Progressives Congress (APC), the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Labour Party (LP) and the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP).

Hear him: We actually reviewed the manifestos of all the political parties before we went to that programme and “the conclusion that we had is that with all the rhetoric about making 20,000 megawatts or 25,000 megawatts, there is no analysis of the problem that made us to stay on 4,000 megawatts as of today and there is nothing to show how the 20,000 megawatts is going to be made.” Mohammad added that “the conclusion is that if they come to power, they are likely going to spend another four years just like the current government has spent seven years without a significant movement in the power sector; that’s exactly what is going to be.”

If this is not scary enough, we wonder what else could be scary, particularly with regard to the country’s power sector which is fast becoming a case of the more you look, the less you see.

To start with, we commend PWC for putting together such a programme, to enable us know the thinking of those who intend to manage the power sector post-2023. Power is pivotal to nearly everything we do today. In Nigeria, specifically, it has remained a knotty issue that successive administrations have tried to crack without much success. At a time, we thought the solution lay in privatising the sector and this was done, at least substantially about a decade ago, without much success. The problems persist; including the very basic issue of metering. Governments across board have pumped in several billions of Naira into the sector without much to show for it. The Olusegun Obasanjo administration alone reportedly committed a whopping $13 billion into the power sector. It has not had much impact on power supply, which largely remains epileptic.

Yet, government after government had raised hopes of improved and sustained power supply at their inception. Even the Buhari administration would find it difficult to believe that where we are after nearly eight years of its presidency is the best it can offer in the power sector, even if the government cannot publicly admit this inadequacy. We have had all manner of projects and schemes aimed at improving power supply, all to no avail.

What all of these tell us is that we are not getting things right with what we consider the issues in the sector and how they can be tackled. This is where the views of people like Mohammad and others who should know should not be dismissed with a wave of the hand.

Even if we think the problem can be summarised under one heading: corruption, we still must understand its multidimensional nature to be able to tackle it frontally.

The former TCN boss, who is also a former staff of the African Development Bank (AfDB) gave some vivid descriptions of some of these issues which whoever wins the presidential election would find valuable, alongside other thoughts expressed at the various workshops and symposiums that have been held ostensibly for the way forward in the beleaguered power sector. 

Some of his submissions might be novel, certainly some others are familiar. But what cannot be dismissed is the fact that the country has a lot to benefit from them. Indeed, it is doubtful if we can have regular power supply without addressing most of the issues he raised.

A lot of the money spent on power by the Obasanjo administration went into the

National Integrated Power Project (NIPP), a thing we did not do any feasibility study on to know the likely challenges that would be encountered in the process of bringing in the turbines, etc. The result? According to Mohammad: “They brought these gas turbines under FOB, and some of them stayed for more than four years in Port Harcourt, with no road even to carry them; the bridges were not tested to see whether they could be carried. So, we didn’t even clear the place where we were going to install the gas turbines and there was no gas supply to the locations.”

He said this was the situation with transmission too, hence the monumental failure in that area of the power mix.

Mohammad gave as an example of corruption in the sector the 330KV substation from Alauji to Owerri to Iyala to Onitsha: “That line has been funded 100 per cent through LC and all the money has been withdrawn. There’s no line nowhere and nothing, simply because the necessary studies that were supposed to be done were not done.”

As a matter of fact, he said despite his strategic position at the time he was in charge at TCN, he was sidelined when some of the contracts were awarded because those involved knew he would not play ball with them. Eventually, he had to be removed, according to him, obviously to make the coast clear for those with ulterior motives to continue milking the country dry without anyone to spill the beans. It was in one of such instances, he said that: “We completed all the studies and launched procurement. We were about to sign the contract and everything and then they announced that they had sacked me; no query, no nothing.”

Mohammad spoke on several other things, including the Mambilla Power Project, how we ended up giving the electricity distribution companies to neophytes who have neither the fund nor the technical expertise to run them properly. The government resorted to this when it became obvious that no foreign companies was interested in coming in because we were not ready to do the right studies to determine their viability.

With regard to Mambila, a major stumbling block, according to Mohammad, is the high cost of the electricity it would generate. “So, forget about what they talk about; they have litigation with some people, and there is no project because at 13 cents per kilowatt hour, it doesn’t make economic sense for anybody to put his money there; that is the fact.”

Of course we also had policy flip-flops on the part of successive administrations, among other factors. 

Perhaps what could not be determined is whether some of the mistakes made in the course of executing some of the power projects were those of the head or the heart. The point, though, is that corruption and incompetence loomed large. This has to be so because the former, in particular, is a national malaise. So, the power sector could not have been without its own share of the cankerworm. Not only was it not satisfied with being an average player in the corruption index, it was adjudged the second most corrupt public institution in Nigeria, trailing behind the police force which blazed the trail in that regard. Unfortunately, despite this unenviable credential, no government has deemed it fit to beam any serious searchlight on this sector. The consequence is that power supply has remained elusive, whether to power industrial plants or for comfort in the homes.

All said, Mohammad’s views, as espoused in that interview, would seem a compendium of sorts on how to fix the country’s power sector. Nigeria has a lot of lessons to learn from experience if it must provide reliable electricity to power-hungry Nigerians, whether for industrial or domestic purposes. If we continue along the present trajectory, the country’s industrialisation dream would remain the pipe dream that it has always been. And this would not augur well for us as a nation.