After Nigerian govt spends N1.7trn, El-Rufai says ‘power sector broken, unsustainable’

The Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai, said on Thursday the present administration has spent N1.7 trillion on the nation’s electricity sector in the last three years.

El-Rufai, who stated this after the National Economic Council (NEC) meeting in Abuja, said such huge expenditure on the “broken” electricity sector is “unsustainable.”

To tackle the myriads of problems plaguing the power sector, he said the federal government must be ready to take difficult decisions in the interest of Nigerians.

The governor said: “Those solutions are not going to be nice, they may be painful but the only way to solve the structural problems in the industry is to take some very difficult decisions.

“The entire sector is broken, the tariff remains an issue, the way the privatization was done is an issue to many. So there are many issues.

“What we have agreed is that there are fundamental problem in the electricity supply industry. And that you cannot privatize industry and then over three years since privatization, you pump in N1.7 trillion of government funds into it, that is not privatization.

“The federal government has supported the electricity sector with N1.7 trillion in the last three years and this is not sustainable.”

He implored Nigerians not to pass a verdict on the power sector until a panel set up by the federal government to review the performance of the electricity distribution companies (DisCoS) submits its report.

El Rufai added: “I will plead that we don’t begin to pass judgement until we submit our final report.

“The problems in electricity are many, capacity is one perhaps. There are some that have shown a lack of capacity. It is true but there are many that are fantastic, so it is very difficult to pass quick judgement.”

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