Unknown people have plunged parts of six states in south-east and southern regions of Nigeria into darkness by vandalising electricity power lines, Power and Steel Minister Lyel Imoke said on Wednesday.
The damage led to the collapse of five major 330kV towers serving the south-eastern states of Abia, Imo, Akwa Ibom and Cross River, as well as southern states of Bayelsa and Rivers, he told journalists after a Cabinet meeting.
“What we have is an incident that appears to have occurred as a result of the heat that was generated from the vandalisation of a pipeline, which resulted in a fire incident that has affected the conductors on heavy transmission lines and has caused the collapse of five towers,” he said.
“This incident is coming on the heels of the vandalising of the gas pipeline by the militant youth in the Niger Delta last February 18 and as I speak to you today [Wednesday], the pipelines have still not been fixed,” Imoke said.
“So we still have a situation where we are losing about 700MW every day of available generation capacity that is shut down because we have not been able to complete the repair of the gas pipeline,” the minister said.
Imoke said the current peak-generation capacity in the country is about 2Â 900MW, as against current peak estimated demand of about 8Â 000MW.
Imoke said the government target is to have a generation capacity of about 10Â 000MW by the end of 2007.
Power supply across the country has been terrible this year and it is widely believed that the government’s dream of generating 10Â 000MW by the end of next year is forlorn.
Before it changed its name last year to Power Holding Company of Nigeria from the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA), Nigerians derisively changed the acronymn to “Never Expect Power Always”.
The power agency, being prepared for privatisation this year, is one of the most-criticised government agencies for its inefficiency and corruption. — AFP