Nigeria News
Reuters: Still a long way in Nigeria for stable electricity
In an unwanted daily routine lasting 17 years, Phillip Cleatus sits in the dark doorway of his shoe-making shop in Nigeria’s northern city of Kaduna, waiting for the lights to come back on.
President Goodluck Jonathan is trying to persuade Cleatus and some 170 million other Nigerians that will soon change.
Yet while his plan to privatize power is creeping forward, it is likely to take decades to end the chronic electricity shortages that are among the main barriers to investment and growth in Africa’s second biggest economy and top oil producer.
PHCN power installation:
Nigeria is in the process of breaking up the defunct state power company into 17 private generation and distribution companies and selling them for about $ 2.5 billion in total, as part of efforts to increase electricity output tenfold over the next seven years.
It might be its most advanced effort yet to end its perennial power shortfall, but progress has been so slow that Jonathan’s targets look far too optimistic. Industry experts believe some improvements will be felt in 2-3 years.
If Nigeria gets the lights working it would reduce business costs by up to 40 percent, add 3 percent to GDP and cut the mass unemployment that fuels unrest seen in oil theft in the south and a bloody Islamist insurgency in the north, economists say.
It could also spur a boom in labor intensive areas like manufacturing, food processing, textiles and pharmaceuticals, while opening up the opportunity for new low-cost service industries like the call centers that aided India’s rise.
The $ 13 billion a year that Nigerians spend on diesel, most of which is imported, would be a bill of the past. Power from generators costs more than twice as much as from the grid.
“This is killing my business, I lose 45 percent of my annual profit to poor power supply,” Cleatus, 38, told Reuters.
GENERATORS
A glitzy ceremony hosted by Jonathan last week celebrated the first payment by private companies which are taking over the unbundled state electricity firm and a deal by the World Bank to give an initial $ 145 million risk guarantee for gas supply.
A close look at the private companies which won bids shows a mix of oligarchs and influential figures connected to Nigeria’s political elite, and some recognized technical partners like Siemens and Manila Electric.
This has raised some questions about the expected efficiency of the privatization process and what it can deliver, but there are those who argue that effective business in Nigeria is impossible without political connections and patrons.
“Much has been achieved, yet the race will not be over until Nigerians can take electricity supply for granted,” Jonathan told dignitaries and power companies last week at his villa.
Electricity capacity had been in steady decline for a decade when Jonathan launched his reform plan in 2010, pledging Nigeria would boost generation from 3,000 megawatts (MW) to 10,000 MW by the end of this year, and 40,000 MW by 2020.
Generation has increased to around 4,000 MW but experts say there is zero hope of meeting government targets, while the scale of the task means power output will initially fall after the privatization is completed at the end of this year.
Despite being Africa’s top oil producer and holding the world’s ninth largest gas reserves, Nigeria’s power output is a tenth of South Africa’s for a population three times the size.
“It will probably take Nigeria another 50 years before it attains the same level of electricity consumption per capita as South Africa currently enjoys today,” said David Ladipo, whose company Azura is spending $ 700 million to build a 450 MW plant.
Ladipo thinks electricity output could grow to 6,000 MW in the next two years and to 9,000 MW by 2020, before seeing a potential boom as post-privatization investment kicks in.
One industry expert told Reuters Nigeria’s potential demand is estimated to be as high as 140,000 MW and rising, so just keeping up with demand will be a huge challenge.
THE TURNAROUND?
Even Ladipo’s more modest projections, which several other industry experts broadly agreed with, face hurdles.
Privatization is months behind schedule and government is struggling to get the funding it needs for crucial transmission and gas supply infrastructure. Powerful labor unions are blocking attempts to pay off 40,000 state electricity workers.
Nigeria says it has found 340 billion naira ($ 2.1 billion) to pay off the workers, but they remain reluctant to leave.
The African Development Bank is providing $ 150 million to aid with transmission and some of a $ 1 billion debut Eurobond would help with upgrades. But in Nigeria, just making the money available doesn’t always mean it will be used wisely.
Some $ 40 billion has gone into several power reform drives in the last 20 years, industry experts say, much of it wasted.
“In the past the problem has not been capacity of government to find money for the power sector: billions have been allocated – and billions have been squandered or stolen,” said Antony Goldman, head of Africa-focused PM Consulting.
Still, there remains optimism that wrestling power out of government hands will eventually lead to progress.
“Given the scale of the challenge and the history of the sector … reform is progressing very well,” said Fola Fabule, a Lagos-based investment banker focused on infrastructure finance.
“The key… will be commitment to see reforms through.”
.Analysis by Reuters team
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The Kano State Government on Saturday said it has transferred 1,098 ‘almajiris’ to different states of the country.
The commissioner for local government, Murtala Garo, disclosed this while presenting a report before the state’s task force on COVID-19 at the government house, Kano.
Almajiris are children who are supposed to be learning Islamic studies while living with their Islamic teachers. Majority of them, however, end up begging on the streets of Northern Nigeria. They constitute a large number of Nigeria’s over 10 million out-of-school children.
Mr Garo said the Kano government transported 419 almajiris to Katsina, 524 to Jigawa and 155 to Kaduna. He said all of them tested negative for coronavirus before leaving the Kano State.
Despite the coronavirus test done in Kano for the almajiris, the Jigawa government earlier said it would quarantine for two weeks all the almajiris that recently arrived from Kano.
Mr Garo said another 100 almajiris scheduled to be taken to Bauchi State also tested negative to COVID-19.
In a remark, Governor Abdullahi Ganduje said the COVID-19 situation in Kano was getting worse. He appealed for a collaborative effort to curtail the spread of the virus in the state.
Mr Ganduje, who commended residents for complying with the lockdown imposed in the state, said the decision was taken to halt the spread of the virus.
Kano State, as of Saturday night, has 77 coronavirus cases, according to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.
The decision to transfer the Kano almajiris is part of the agreement reached between Northern governors that almajiris in each state be transferred to their states of origin.
However, even before the latest agreement by the governors, the Kano government had been transferring almajiris to other states and neighbouring countries after it banned street begging in the state, most populous in Northern Nigeria.
Despite the transfers, however, no concrete step has been taken to ensure such children do not return to Kano streets as there is freedom of movement across Nigeria although interstate travel was recently banned to check the spread of the coronavirus.
Sourced From: Premium Times Nigeria
By Ugochukwu Alaribe
Operatives of the Abia State Vigilante Service, AVS, popularly known as ‘Bakassi Boys’ have arrested 24 market women hidden in a container truck, at Ekwereazu Ngwa, the boundary community between Abia and Akwa Ibom states.
The market women, said to be from Akwa Ibom State, were on their way to Aba, when they were arrested with the truck driver and two of his conductors for violating the lockdown order by the state government.
Driver of the truck, Moses Asuquo, claimed he was going to Aba to purchase stock fish, but decided to assist the market women, because they were stranded.
A vigilante source told Sunday Vanguard that the vehicle was impounded while the market women were sent back to Akwa Ibom State.
Commissioner for Home Land Security, Prince Dan Okoli, who confirmed the incident, said that smuggling of people into the state poses great threat to the state government’s efforts to contain the spread of COVID- 19.
Sourced From: Vanguard News
Operatives of the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (SCIID), Yaba of the Lagos State police command have arrested one Mrs Nene Steve for allegedly killing her maid, Joy Adole
The maid was allegedly beaten to death by Nene for requesting for her salary at their residence located at 18, Ogundola Street, Bariga area in Lagos.
Narrating the incident, Philips Ejeh, an elder brother to the deceased said that he was sad when they informed him that his sister was beaten to death.
He explained that the deceased was an indigene of Benue State brought to Lagos through an agent and started working with her as a maid in January 2020.
‘’She reported that her boss refused to pay her and anytime she asked for her salary she will start beating her.
She was making an attempt to leave the place but due to the total lockdown she remained there until Sunday when her boss said she caught her stealing noodles and this led to her serious beating and death,’’ Ejeh said.
He called on Lagos State Government and well- meaning people in the country to help them in getting justice for the victim.
The police spokesman, Bala Elkana, stated that the woman and her husband came to Bariga Police Station to a report that their house girl had committed suicide.
Detectives were said to have visited the house and suspected foul play with the position of the rope and bruises all over the body which confirmed that the girl had been tortured to death and the boss decided to hang up the girl to make it look like suicide.
He said: “The police moved on with their investigation and found a lot of sign of violence on her body that she has been tortured before a rope was put on her neck.’’
He added that the police removed the corpse and deposited it in the mortuary for autopsy to further ascertain the cause of the death.
Elkana said the matter has been transferred from Bariga police station to Panti for further investigation while the couple have been arrested and will be charged to court.
Ostensibly alarmed by the latest killings of dozens of soldiers by Boko Haram insurgents, President Muhammadu Buhari has summoned an urgent meeting of Service Chiefs to find ways to stop the trend.
He has also dispatched the Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan Ali, to the neighbouring Republic of Chad for an urgent meeting with President Idris Deby and his defence counterpart.
Knowledgeable sources said in Abuja on Friday that the president is worried by on the deterioration of security situation on the Nigeria – Chad Border that has led to the recently increased Boko Haram terrorism in the area.
The sources which did not want to be named in Abuja said: “Nigeria has a Chad problem in the Multi-National Joint Task Force (MNJTF) put together to secure the Lake Chad basin areas and repeal the Boko Haram terrorist attacks against all the countries neighbouring the Lake.”
The sources noted that Chad is believed to be having their own internal security challenges and this has reportedly led to their pulling away their own troops manning their own border around Lake Chad, saying: “That lacuna is being exploited by the Boko Haram terrorists, who go in and out of Nigeria, Niger and Cameroon to launch terrorist acts. This is a clear illustration of the fact that terrorism is beyond national borders.”
When contacted, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, confirmed that the Defence Minister is going to Chad but said he is unaware of the purpose.
Meanwhile, the military authorities are said to be in the process of identifying the families of the latest victims with a view to making contact with them.
Credible sources revealed that it is the reason the president is yet to make any pronouncement on the matter.
“The President has called an urgent meeting with the Service Chiefs, as well as the fact that families of the latest victims of the Boko Haram are being identified and contacts made before a government pronouncement on the tragic attacks. This, it is understood, is the reason for the silence of the government over the incident,” the source said.
Sourced From: Tribune
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