Waiting expectantly for an ambitious scheme that will transform the state but also compound its population
Governor Akinwunmi Ambode of Lagos State would have opened a brand new chapter in the annals of governance in the state if he succeeds in seeing to fruition his government’s Embedded Power Project. Although it would not be the first in the state’s history, it is an ambitious project that would impact massively on power supply. The state House of Assembly gave its consent to the project on January 29 when it passed the Lagos State Electric Power Reform Bill while Governor Ambode signed the bill, alongside six other bills, on February 8, to become laws. The idea of the power project is to generate electricity 24 hours daily for Lagosians towards improving the state’s economy and night life which many people who were born in Lagos or stayed for about two decades in the state would readily agree has fast disappeared.
The first beneficiaries of the project are those in places like Ikeja, Ajah and Lekki while it would be extended to other parts of the state over time. Although the target is to generate about 3,000MW, the project will start with 1,000MW and gradually move up to the 3,000MW.
Without doubt, this is sweet music in that it is an ambitious project designed to free the state from the unsteady and unreliable power supply from the National Grid, which has been more of a curse than a blessing. One thing is clear, unless we want to continue deceiving ourselves, the present power supply arrangement in the country, in spite of the privatisation of the sector, cannot take us anywhere. Many people who had thought the privatisation would bring about improved power supply must have been disappointed at the way things have turned out, more than four years down the line. It was either those who bought the distribution companies in particular did not do their due diligence well, or they just thought they would continue to exploit Nigerians through dubious electricity bills that they could not explain how they came about, just like their precursors; the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA) and the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN).
In the first place, the National Grid is senselessly risky; given the aphorism that one should not keep one’s eggs in one basket. But the soldiers who seized power and imposed a unitary system of government came with their one-cap-fits-all, not only in the power sector, but in other sectors as well. Before then, every region in the country was developing at its own pace and there was a healthy competition among them. The soldiers reversed all that, and this is at the root of the clamour for a return to (true) federalism today. Many sections of the country have seen the reality that one cap can never fit all; even God who created us did not design things that way. That is why we have people with big heads even as we have those with miniature heads.
Lagos State saw the return to democratic rule in 1999 as a good opportunity to launch its own electricity project and free itself from the shackles of the ineffectual National Grid. That was why the state government, under the leadership of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu sponsored an Independent Power Project handled by a U.S. company, Enron. The project was expected to provide additional 270 megawatts of electricity for Lagos. The then NEPA, quite expectedly, raised issues over the project but the worst obstacle came from the then President Olusegun Obasanjo. The rest is now history. Suffice it to say that the opposition to the project led to its ability to deliver only 90MW, a drop in the ocean.
We can only imagine the damage this has done to the economy of Lagos in particular and the nation as a whole. Lagos is not only the country’s commercial hub; it is also its industrial capital. It is therefore not surprising that the state alone consumes about 40 percent of the electricity generated in the country. If, therefore, we have been complaining about perennial epileptic power supply, Lagos must have suffered the most.
Power is pivotal to everything we do. We need it to run our industries, to power our electrical and electronic equipment both for comfort and relaxation. In a typical tropical climate like ours, we need power to keep our fans and air-conditioners working so that we can sleep well. Although things have been made easier for countries like ours, with all manner of rechargeable items, we still need power to charge those equipment when there is power supply so they can be useful to us when light goes off.
The other day, the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) gladly embraced the 2,000MW stranded power that the distribution companies (DISCOs) cannot absorb because it will save a lot of money for them; it means they will have to spend less on diesel to power their generators. It is on record that some industries and companies have since cut themselves off from the National Grid while some permanently switch over to generators whenever they want to start production. Many of the industrial giants that had left the country, like Michelin and Dunlop, had their plants here in Lagos. Their unceremonious exit meant thousands of direct job losses and even more by way of indirect redundancies.
It is heartwarming that consumers of the embedded power will only pay for what they use. This is a major attraction in that the question of appropriate billing is one of the main issues Nigerians have with the DISCOs that are not willing to provide prepaid meters because of the rent they make from estimated billing. There will be no room for any ambiguous charges.
The Lagos State government must however have a Plan B to fall back on should the DISCOs bring in their present business model into the embedded power project. One is here talking about the government ultimately having plans for its own distribution lines/wires instead of relying on the DISCOs. I know this, apart from being expensive will also be cumbersome, but it may be worth it after all. The state government, no doubt has a good intention but this can easily be frustrated by the DISCOs if they see that it is denying them revenue at least in those areas to be served by the project. They may choose to be blind to the larger picture.
The state government must put in place the reliable machineries it promised for efficiency and sustainable electricity supply through the embedded power project. In order not to run into the same problem of inability to distribute the power that will be provided, the government must ensure that the distribution network in Lagos is upgraded and improved upon. New wires and cables should be provided where necessary and even distribution transformers changed because many of them are old and outdated.
It is however good that the project will be private sector driven. But then, we have seen from the privatisation of some government entities that privatisation alone will not necessarily guarantee efficiency. Therefore, the state government will still have to ensure that its officials who will monitor and regulate the project do their job in the best interest of the people and the investors. There should be no compromises. One is happy that the government is not striving to protect the interest of power consumers alone, but that of the investors as well. Hence, its provision in the law to handle any power theft issue. Anyone that is caught will be jailed or heavily fined. This will put investors’ minds at rest that their investments will not go down the drain.
But, then, the number of people that will want to engage in power theft will be few because many Nigerians will readily pay once they are sure they are paying only for the power they consume rather than paying bills concocted by some officials in the comfort of their air-conditioned offices. This is the main reason many people are reluctant to pay electricity bills. They cannot vouch for the integrity, fairness and accuracy of the so-called bills. The government has come out to say that customers will slightly pay higher for it, I do not think this will be a major problem. I was at a power summit at Dopemu, Lagos, sometime last year and I saw a lot of artisans giving their blessing to the power project that was supposed to have started at the Alimosho Local Government Area sometime in 2016. I do not know whether it is this same project that has now been reworked. But the artisans readily agreed that they were ready to pay, especially with the 24/7 power supply attraction. They compared it with what they are losing either by not working because there is no power supply, or by working on generators. This, however, should not mean that the investors should exploit this to charge arbitrarily. Yes, they are here to make profit; yet, they should not exploit the situation by overcharging consumers and start arguing that it has to be so because electricity is more expensive in Benin Republic or Niger, as some people are arguing with fuel.
One can only hope that the state government is gearing up for the other side of this development that has the potential of compounding the state’s population, especially in a country where many state governments have simply gone to bed, and their indigenes rushing to the ‘city’ in search of the proverbial greener pastures that they could not get back in the ‘village’.
I cannot wait to see Lagos returning to its glorious past, when as children; we used to play on the streets, not knowing the difference between night and day, until our parents would call us that it was bedtime.
