President Muhammadu Buhari has assured Nigerians that the inconveniences caused by the prolonged shortage of petroleum products, and the collapse of the national grid, would soon be a thing of the past.
In a statement by his spokesman, Garba Shehu, the president while apologizing to Nigerians, promised that relief is on the way.
Buhari expressed sadness at the fact that Nigerians are experiencing at the moment something which he says his administration has successfully averted within its seven years in office.
President Buhari said: “The government is working round the clock to attend to this issue. An action plan agreed earlier this month is being implemented to address the scarcity. Working together with the Major Oil Marketers Association of Nigeria (MOMAN) and the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN), this plan is now bearing fruit”.
He said sufficient fuel supply has returned to a handful of states with reduced queues at stations falling, adding that in the coming days, that would be the case across the rest of the country.
“Looking to the longer term, funds are being targeted toward keeping fuel availability affordable for the country. The international energy markets have surged drastically in recent months; the government will however ensure that consumers are protected against these price spikes,” he said.
The President added that he has received information that some people are not behaving properly at the depots and among owners of petrol stations and in this regard, he has directed the Ministry of Petroleum Resources, the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA), the NNPC and the entire security apparatus of the nation to take strong action against those responsible.
On the issue of electricity blackouts experienced across the nation, President Buhari remarked that the situation is also being addressed.
“A dip in hydroelectric generation due to seasonal pressures has coincided with technical and supply problems at thermal stations. On this, the government is also working tirelessly to resolve the issues at the latter to guarantee sufficient power flows into the national grid,” Buhari said.
President Buhari disclosed that as part of emergency measures put in place following a meeting convened with key stakeholders to address the low power generation in the country, the main challenge was identified as being one of low gas power generation due to sabotage of gas pipelines leading to a shutdown of power plants coupled with ongoing routine maintenance on other gas power plants.
“To recover over 1000MW, actions were agreed upon between the players in the Nigerian Electricity Supply Industry (NESI) and also NNPC. The actions targeted the National Integrated Power Project (NIPP) plants, (Niger Delta Power Holding Company (NDPHC) and power plants run under NNPC Joint Ventures, Agip and Shell (NAOC and SPDC) and progress on the key actions have already ensured the restoration to the grid of 375MW after the pipeline from “Okpai 1” was repaired.
“To also ramp up the underutilised capacity of the NDPHC capacity, a USD 50 Million Gas Supply agreement is being finalized to secure the sustainability of up to 800MW of underutilized NIPP assets,” he explained.
The President assured Nigerians that the government’s attention to these problems will bear fruits very soon.
Earlier, the Minister of Power, Abubakar Aliyu, has said the national grid, which collapsed a few days ago, has now been recovered.
He disclosed this during a briefing after the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting presided over by the Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo.
Aliyu said several resolutions have emerged from a series of emergency meetings held by the power ministry, where all stakeholders have extensively discussed the issues and resolved all bickering.
The minister, who likened Nigeria’s power challenge to a war situation, further maintained that the country generates up to 8,000 MW.
According to Aliyu, the shortage of gas and maintenance of generators, the fuel situation (which he argued has been addressed by the NNPC), all combined to exacerbate the problem with the national grid.
The power minister equally affirmed that the Federal Executive Council has given approval of N5 billion to open up and expand Lagos/Ogun, to reinforce power supply to that region.
Lagos, Abuja, Enugu, and other cities across the country experienced a blackout on Monday following the collapse of the national grid.
No fewer than four Distribution Companies (DISCOs) confirmed the development via social media, informing their customers of the situation in their respective domains.
They blamed the outage being experienced by consumers in various states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) on a general system collapse that occurred at about 10:40am.
In a statement by its Head of Corporate Communications, Emeka Ezeh, the Enugu Electricity Distribution Plc (EEDC) said it was on standby and awaiting a signal from the National Control Centre (NCC) for restoration of supply.
“The Enugu Electricity Distribution PLC (EEDC) wishes to inform her esteemed customers in the South East of a general system collapse which occurred this morning, Monday, 14th March 2022 at 10:40 am,” Ezeh said.
“This is the reason for the loss of supply currently being experienced across the network. Consequently, all our outgoing feeders are out and supply to our customers in Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu, and Imo States are affected by this development.”
On its part, the Eko Electricity Distribution Company (EKEDC) assured its customers that it was following up with the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) to restore power/
“Dear esteemed customer(s), we regret to inform you of a total system collapse on the national grid at 10:40 am today, leading to outages across our network.
“We are closely monitoring the situation with our TCN partners to determine the cause and a timeline for resolution. We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience as we will keep you updated on the situation,” it said.
The Abuja Electricity Distribution Plc (AEDC) and Kaduna Electric also notified their customers about the outage in separate statements.