Nigeria Electricity in ‘Penkelemesi’ Under Adelabu’s Watch 

Human expectations are indeed burdens. But competent leaders are made to bear these burdens, growing more brilliant with every passing moment. The Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu, does not seem to share this view. Since taking over the power sector, only promises and ideas have originated from him, no execution.

Electricity generation remains a difficult area for the present administration of renewed hope. Under President Bola Tinubu, this agenda appears to have divorced itself from electricity supply, resulting in the continued jerking of the nation’s power grid and the relegation of the man in charge, Adelabu, to the bench of finger-pointing and blame-throwing.

Whether it is a matter of competence, only Adelabu’s appointer, President Tinubu, knows. What is apparent to all is that little has changed since the former deputy governor in charge of operations at the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) took over. With his seeming inaction, Adelabu is winning more people over to the other side, causing people to go from optimistic to pessimistic, all wondering over the ‘penkelemesi’ that Nigeria has gotten itself into.

It is not that Adelabu is not doing anything. Recently, he reported that Nigerians get a significant fraction of their electricity from petrol- and diesel-powered generators, reaching up to 40,000 megawatts (MW). He also reported that as of 2022, a little over 71 per cent of electricity comes from gas, 27 per cent from hydro, and the rest from solar and others.

With these reports, Adelabu has reminded Nigerians that he knows what office he is occupying and is doing crouching exercises with it so it can leap into the sky with elegance later. But things are dragging and businesses are losing revenue to generators and other alternatives for electricity generation.

Is this not the power sector in ‘penkelemesi’ under Adelabu’s watch? Is this not hope unravelling rather than renewing?