24hrs power supply: Shell counters Fashola

Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company (SNEPCo) has picked holes in a statement credited to Minister of Works, Power and Housing, Babatunde Fashola that Nigeria now enjoy 24-hour electricity supply.0

The Minister had during a live TV programme on Channels TV said some states now enjoy 24-hour electricity supply.

But the Managing Director of the oil giant, Bayo Ojulari, said that approximately 70 per cent of Nigerian households do not enjoy daily electricity supply.

ALSO READ: ‘I warned Aworis against outright sale of lands’

Ojulari who disclosed this during a presentation at the recently concluded 2019 Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) Oloibiri Lecture Series and Energy Forum in Abuja, said Nigerians including small businesses have access to power supply that lasts less than four hours daily.

He added that Kebbi and Yobe States were under this category.

He said, to bridge this gap, the country would need between 30 to 175GW (Gigawatt) of electricity at a cost of between $40 and $200bn.

He noted that the power sector was basically driven by ageing equipment, maintenance systems and culture, as well as insufficient funding.

According to him, this forms the basis of the country’s economic woes in health, education, insecurity, agriculture, and unemployment and food security.