The Federal Government of Nigeria has blamed the shortage in gas supply on its inability to generate the promised target of 5,000 megawatts of electricity.
This was made known by the Minister of Power, Abubakar Aliyu, while briefing State House correspondents at the end of the weekly Federal Executive Council, FEC, meeting yesterday which was presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari at the Council Chamber, Presidential Villa.
He revealed that whereas the government had entered into a firm contract with the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading, NBET, Plc, power generation had remained around 4,000 megawatts because of the problem of gas.
But he claimed that everything needed to fix the issue has already been acquired and that his ministry was working around the clock to make things better.
According to the minister, FEC authorised revised estimates totaling N2,74 billion for the updated building rates for compensatory structures and resettlement of the communities impacted by the construction of the 700 megawatt Zungaru Hydroelectric Power Project.
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The amount revises the subsisting amount from N19,640,000,000 to N22,380,000,000.
He said: ‘Today (yesterday), I approached counsel to seek approval of revised estimates total costs for the updated rates of building structures of compensation and resettlement of the communities affected by the construction of 700 megawatts Zungaro Hydroelectric power project in the total sum of N2,740,000,000, which will revise the subsisting amount from N19,640,000,000 to N22,380,000,000 and the council graciously approve the request.
‘Regarding the drop of electricity, yes, you know, the supply has so many players, gas, the cost that dropped, issues of gas to some power plants, they cannot switch on their plant if they do, you will experience some drop once, they switch on, the electricity will increase.
‘There may be a drop due to fault of generator. I’ve been watching since, like yesterday (Tuesday) evening, we had a generation of around 4600 megawatts. And you know, we told you since July 1 that we’ll be able to raise it up to 5000MW when we activated the contract.
‘We have not been able to do so due to some issues around gas contracts, gas-to-power, which we are trying to take care of. And we have gone very far with that, and I believe it is for that reason that we are able to reach up to 4600 as of yesterday (Tuesday).
‘This morning (yesterday), it dropped to 4100MW. So, this is what is happening. You will be experiencing this fluctuation due to all these issues around gas-to-power, because gas is not something we control directly. They will not give you gas until you pay, so we are looking at ways to solve that issue’ he submitted.
He said the Federal Government had firm contracts with only five of the 28 power generating companies but had extended it to more GenCos to stabilise supply at 5000MW as of July 1.