BY Taiwo Adebulu
President Muhammadu Buhari, on Monday, signed a power project deal with Siemens, Germany-based firm.
According to a tweet by the official presidential Twitter account, the project will deliver 7,000 megawatts (MW) of electricity to the national grid by 2021.
The country currently generates less than 5000MW, while power supply has been poor due to less than 4000MW being distributed to Nigerians.
The president noted that the project may not be the solution to the challenges facing the electricity sector.
“Today, in partnership with the German Government and Siemens AG, we are making an important move forward in addressing Nigeria’s electricity challenge. Our goal is a simple one: to deliver more electricity to Nigerian businesses and homes,” he said.
“My challenge to Siemens, our partner investors in the Distribution Companies, the TCN, and NERC, is to work hard to achieve the target of 7,000 megawatts of reliable power supply by 2021 and 11,000 megawatts by 2023 – in phases 1 and 2 of this initiative, respectively.
“Our intention is to ensure that our cooperation is structured under a Government-to-Government framework. No middlemen will be involved so that we can achieve value for money for Nigerians.
“We also insist that all products be manufactured to high quality German and European standards and competitively priced.
“This project will not be the solution to ALL our problems in the power sector. However, I am confident that it has the potential to address a significant amount of the challenges we have faced for decades.
“It is our hope that as the power situation improves, we will improve investor confidence, create jobs, reduce the cost of doing business and encourage more economic growth in Nigeria”
The deal was facilitated by Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, when she visited Nigeria in August 2018.
The Nigerian Electricity Regulation Commission, led by John Momoh, its chairman, also partook in the negotiations.
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