The Honourable Minister of Power, Mr. Adebayo Adelabu, has said that the ministry is working on appropriate laws that will drive local content improvement in the sector.
Adelabu the statement at a meeting with Electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos) and key stakeholders in the sector in Abuja yesterday as reported by News Agency of Nigeria, NAN.
The report quoted Adelabu to have said, “We have all decided as a team to deliberately work on improving the local content in the power sector by working on a legislation that will drive compliance with local contents improvement in the operation of the sector”; adding, “To achieve this goal, we will also put together appropriate policies that will support this and enable the ease of compliance by the power sector operators”.
Continuing, the Minister said, ”At the same time, appropriate regulations will also be rolled out to ensure compliance and add value to the local contents bill. To achieve this, we are going to set up a committee that will start working on the issue”.
The committee, according to him, would gather data, do a lot of engagement and investigation across all the three segments in the power sector, from generation to transmission and to distribution.
Adelabu disclosed that there was already a legislation at the National Assembly on local content that encompasses the power sector, adding that the committee would work on accelerating the passage of the bill on local content.
His words: ”If there is need for a public hearing, we will all go there as power sector stakeholders to defend this bill. I am sure that the President Bola Tinubu will not hesitate to sign this bill into law as soon as it is passed as the advantages of this cannot be over-emphasised beginning with job creation for unemployed youths which would reduce their idleness”.
He added that his recent visits to some local manufacturers had confirmed that there were a good number of manufacturers that can give some impressive proportion of what we want in the power sector, stressing that his ministry also needs to collaborate with the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) to ensure collaboration to achieving this.
The minister said that the power sector achieved 5,155 Megawatts (MW) on August 8, keeping the sector on the right track to achieving 6,000(MW) by end of 2024.
He said, ”We have to sustain it. So we have all identified the impediments to achieving this, which we have discussed here as a team”; adding, “We are working on metering, we are working on transmission lines to ensure that the 6,000 megawatts target for December 2024 is met”.
On the debts owed DisCos by the MDAs (Ministries, Department and Agencies), Adelabu said that the issue was a major burden as it affects liquidity.
He said that after extensive discussions, the ministry was working with other stakeholders on ways to ensure payment of the debts.
