Improved Power Supply Softens Nigerians’ Reaction to Fuel Price Hike – Minister
The Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu, says Nigerians are currently not up in arms over the increase in petrol price because they now rely less on generators for electricity.
The Minister was quoted as saying this during his keynote address at the 2024 edition of the Nigeria Energy Exhibition and Conference, which was held in Lagos on Wednesday and had the theme “Breaking Barriers in the New Energy Era: Clean, Reliable and Sustainable.”
Adelabu argued that the power supply has improved significantly across the country, resulting in people not having to buy fuel to fill their generator tanks.
His remarks come a week after the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) jacked up the petrol price at its retail outlets from N858 to N998 and N1,030.
It came just after the national oil company announced it had quit the middleman role arrangement with Dangote Refinery, signalling the full deregulation of the petroleum downstream sector.
The price review triggered an immediate increase in the cost of transportation, food items, and other essential household commodities in the country.
Minister reveals why Nigerians are not making noise about petrol price
Meanwhile, Adelabu stressed that there has not been an uproar in the country over the increase because people didn’t have to buy petrol at N1000 to power their generators before enjoying electricity.
He added that the Federal Government planned to replace all the generators in the country in alignment with the Lagos State Policy of Replacement of 1 Million Generators in One Year.
“People don’t need to buy petrol again as much as they used to do for them to have power. That’s why the noise is even at this level. If they had to be going to the filling stations to buy N1000 per litre of petrol to generate electricity, we would have even had louder noise from the public.
“So, what we intend to do is to make sure that all the generators are replaced in line with Lagos State Policy of Replacement of 1 Million Generators in One Year. I saw that. We must replace all the generators,” he said.
The Minister who reflected on Nigeria’s power generation lamented the slow pace of growth in the sector over the last four decades.
“It took us almost 40 years to generate additional 2000MW from the 2000MW milestone we achieved in 1984. Now, we have taken it to an average of 5000MW, with a peak of 5,527MW on the third of September. But we are not deterred. If the last best time was 50 years ago, I believe the next best time is today, and this must wake us up. So, it’s an issue I don’t like to remember,” he added.
