Adelabu: Power Sector Almost Jinxed Before Tinubu’s Administration

•Says Nigeria has been suffering from bad governance

Emmanuel Addeh in Abuja

The Minister of Power, Chief Adebayo Adelabu, yesterday said that the power sector was almost jinxed before the Bola Tinubu administration, stressing that Nigeria had suffered  from bad governance over the years.

A statement by the minister’s spokesman, Bolaji Tunji, said Adelabu spoke when he received the national youth leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Dayo Israel, who visited him in his office in Abuja.

According to the minister, Nigeria has suffered  from bad governance over the years and efforts to change that narrative will not be an easy one, but must be done in order for  Nigeria to advance in development like other developed nations of the world.

“It is unfortunate that Nigeria has experienced bad governance over the years. Nigeria has gradually gone down, and the efforts being made by President Tinubu is the right way for us to get out of these challenges,” he was quoted as saying.

He called the youths to support the efforts of Tinubu in ensuring that past mistakes were corrected through ongoing reforms and policies.

“The policies and programmes of the government, particularly the removal of the petrol subsidy has increased allocations to state governments through the governors.

“So as youths of the party, you also owe it a duty to inform the youths protesting that the governors of their states are receiving double and in some cases triple of the allocations they used to receive”, he said.

He also outlined the measures that he had taken to transform the power ministry in the one year that he resumed.

He said Tinubu had provided the needed support to make sure the power sector gets back the confidence of Nigerians once again.

“President Tinubu wants to use the power sector to drive the reforms in other sectors of the economy. If you recall in his speech to Nigerians on January 1, he spoke extensively about that sector.

“ Power is one of the sensitive campaign promises he made to Nigerians and he is determined to fulfil that promise. The sector was almost jinxed before we came in but thank God that confidence is coming back now to the sector from the general public.

“Within one year that we came into office, we have been able to increase power generation from 4, 000 megawatts to 5,155 and have a target to move it to 6,000 megawatts by December this year. We are also working on fixing the infrastructure across the power sector value chain,”the minister said.

He also disclosed that some of the institutions that cannot cope with the high cost of electricity such as the universities, teaching hospitals and small businesses, will enjoy the renewable energy initiative being driven by the Rural Electrification Agency (REA).

Speaking earlier,  the national youth leader commended the minister for the noticeable improvement in the supply of electricity to businesses and households in the country.

 He also invited the minister to speak at the ministerial town hall meeting at the Progressives Young leaders summit holding from September 3-5, 2024.

The youth leader said the summit was to give Nigerian youths the opportunity to contribute their voices to shaping the country in line with the renewed hope agenda of the administration.