POWER CHALLENGES: Adeosun puts blame on western powers

Nigeria’s Minister of Finance, Mrs Kemi Adeosun, has accused western powers of frustrating efforts by the nation in addressing its power challenges.

Adeosun, who spoke in Washington on Wednesday at the General Meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, IMF, said Nigeria wants to build a coal power plant that would help address power shortages but the effort is being blocked by Western powers who claimed it is not green.

The minister, who disclosed that power supply improvement is the cornerstone of President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration for economic development, said: “We want to build a coal power plant because we are a country blessed with coal, yet we have power problem. So it doesn’t take a genius to workout that it will make sense to build a coal power plant.

“However, we are being blocked from doing so, because it is not green. This is not fair because they have an entire western industralisation that was built on coal fired energy.

“This is the competitive advantage that was used to develop Europe, yet now that Nigeria wants to do it, they say it’s not green, so we cannot.

“They suggest that we use solar and wind, which is the more expensive. So yes, Africa must invest in its infrastructure, but we must also make sure that the playing field is level,” she said.

By Timothy Enietan-Matthews