National Grid Collapse, Vandalism and Energy Insecurity

Political Economy of Tinubu’s Tax Reform Bills
Jide Ojo

As we count down to the end of 2024, one of the things that define this year is the exponential growth in the incidences of collapse of the national grid supplying electricity to the whole of Nigeria, vandalism of electricity assets across the country and lack of energy security. On the heels of removal of subsidy on petrol last year, this year, Tinubu’s administration has taken a step further to remove subsidy on electricity and the Distribution Companies with the approval of Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, have started a phased increase in the electricity tariffs.

The national grid has collapsed 12 times as of the time of writing this commentary on December 17. There is no guarantee that it won’t happen again before yearend. What exactly does it mean for national grid to collapse? Premium Times report of April 23, 2024, quoted the Transmission Company of Nigeria to have given reasons for the persistent collapse of the national electricity grid in the country. The TCN said the nation’s power sector is currently faced with various challenges, impacting effective service delivery and the ongoing collapse of the national grid.

Nafisat Ali, the executive director of the Independent System Operator department of the TCN, disclosed this during the visit of the Senate Committee on Power on Monday, April 22, 2024. “The causes of grid collapse in Nigeria spread across all participants, from generation companies to transmission and distribution. From generation companies, there is the inadequacy of gas supply, improper coordination of plants and gas pipelines, poor generation availability”.  Under the transmission value chain, she added that lack of operating/spinning reserve and voltage support scheme, lack of reliable SCADA facility, vandalism, tripping of critical infrastructure lines, transition line redundancy and lack of reliable communication facility are the causes for grid collapse.

For the distribution companies, Ms Ali listed the weak distribution networks, load allocation violation, and lack of visibility on the DisCos network, among others, as the reasons for the unending collapse. “Customers can experience interruptions to their electricity Supply for three reasons such as reliability issues, where there is insufficient generation to meet consumer demand at a place and point in time; system security events and problems with the security of the network and transmission/ distribution network failures,” she said.

To achieve a reliable system, Ali said the system must have an adequate amount of capacity (generation, demand response and network capacity) to meet consumer needs. There should be adequate investment in all types of capacity, as well as appropriate operational decisions so that supply and demand are in balance at any point in time “To achieve a reliable power system, it is necessary to include a buffer in the supply and demand balance, known as reserves. This allows the actual demand and supply to be kept in balance, even in the face of shocks to the system,” she added.

Another shocking revelation about the Nigeria electricity security challenge has to do with soaring cases of vandalism. The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Transition Company of Nigeria, Suleiman Abdulaziz, revealed that 128 transmission towers have been destroyed either by vandals or bandits across the country between January and November 2024. He said this at the Quarterly Power Sector Working Group meeting held in Abuja last month. He also said the Federal Government has spent N8.8bn on the repair and restoration of transmission towers that were vandalised across various regions of the country in 2024.

Activities of vandals in the outgoing year had thrown the entire Bayelsa State into darkness since July 2024. The Transmission Company of Nigeria stated on Thursday, August 1 that two transmission towers, T98 and T99 along the Ahoada/Yenagoa 132kV line, were vandalised on July 29, in the Igbooghene community of Bayelsa State. It was just yesterday that the Transmission Company of Nigeria, Port Harcourt Region, announced the restoration of electricity to most parts of Bayelsa following a four-month blackout.

Activities of vandals of electricity assets is not limited to transmission towers. In fact, uncountable acts of vandalism of electricity equipment such as power transformers and cables take place at community levels. In my hood, these unscrupulous elements struck and vandalised our community transformer last year. They were not caught and we have to contribute to replace the stolen asset.  This ordinarily should have been taken care of by the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company but waiting for them to effect repair at no cost to the community is like waiting for Godot.

Unfortunately, the government is yet to prosecute arrested vandals as they are usually released on bail by operatives of the Nigeria Police. This is according to the Special Adviser to the Minister of Power on Strategic Communication and Media Relations, Bolaji Tunji. He was quoted as saying that “It is so sad that each time the vandals were caught and taken to the police for prosecution, police would incident them for theft instead of vandalism, and they would be bailed. If they are charged for vandalism, they cannot be bailed, but this is where we are. So many of them have been arrested, but each time they will be bailed because police often incident their cases as that of theft.” Heartrending!

After about two years of tariff freeze in the power sector, the Federal Government had in April 2024 increased the rate paid per kilowatt-hour of electricity from about N68 to N225 for Band A customers, who it said consistently enjoyed 20 hours of supply daily. Aside the Band ‘A’ category, Band ‘B’ category enjoys at least 16 hours, Band ‘C’ 12 hours, Band ‘D’ eight hours, while Band E will have a minimum of four hours daily. According to an October 2024 analysis of data released by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, which contains DisCos’ commercial performance for the seven months, the distribution companies had billed a total of N1.114tn over the period under review but were able to collect N887.86bn, achieving 79.7 per cent revenue collection efficiency in the country. Unfortunately, despite improved revenue collection rate, service delivery by distribution companies has been dismal.

The implication of lack of energy security is grave both for physical security and the economy. In October this year, Standard Bank says Nigeria is losing $26bn annually to power outages across the country. In its ‘Africa Trade Barometer’ report, Standard Bank said electricity supply is a major barrier to businesses in Nigeria and across Africa, noting that firms in Nigeria spend about $22bn yearly on off-grid fuel to offset the impact of unreliable electricity. The report said this is raising operational costs of businesses in Nigeria. Aside the huge economic loss, pervasive darkness across the country has aided heinous crimes including abduction, burglary, rape, armed robbery, and thefts. In 2025, Nigerians want to see energy security. We want to have affordable and efficient public power supply. This will help reduce unemployment and poverty as many compatriots will be able to engage in productive economic activities which will make them less dependent on government for their survival.

 

X: @jideojong

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