The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) has urged the Federal Government to spend the significant part of the $ 2 billion available to the Rural Electrification Agency (REA) to proffer solutions to the power supply challenges of the country’s industrial hubs.
Vice Chairman, Dr. Musiliu Oseni, gave the charge at the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) 20th anniversary in Abuja.
The theme of the event was “Strengthening Power Sector Governance For A Sustainable Future”
“The government should deliberately make policy to power industry for economic prosperity since mini-grids of the REA can only provide energy access but would not be able to energize the economy to prosperity.
“There must be a deliberate policy by the FGN to power our industry for economic prosperity. You can power access through Mini-Grids but you can’t power your economy to prosperity.
“Thus, there is a need for policy rethink on the utilisation of the USD2bn currently available to the Rural Electrification Agency (“REA”).
“A substantial portion of the fund should be dedicated to providing end-to-end solutions to the power supply challenges facing our industrial hubs,” he said.
Oseni recalled that NERC oversaw the privatisation and unbundling of the hitherto state owned vertically integrated monopoly.
He stressed that the commission has developed standard regulatory instruments to strengthen the electricity market, improve reliability of supply and enhance consumer protection.
He said relative to 20 years ago, not less than 30 per cent of the electricity consumers have experienced significant improvement in their electricity services.
