In this interview with PREMIUM NEWS,Comrade Chinedu Bosah,National Coordinator,Coalition for Affordable and Regular Electricity (CARE),speaks on the ills besetting the country’s power sector and offers suggestions on how best it can add value to Nigeria
What is your take on the recent claim by the World Bank that Federal Government that it borrowed N1.3tr in 3years to subsidize power, consumers firms?
It is true that the Federal Government is spending huge public funds on the power sector mainly to keep the private profiteers in business while in turn, Nigerians continually wallow in darkness. The World Bank is equally part of our problem, it is these Bretton Woods institutions (World Bank and IMF) that encourage the federal government to privatize public corporations and cut social/public spending to so as to save money to service the corrupt and exploitative debts. The fact remains that the private companies feed fat from the constant handout from the government because they cannot survive without public support. What is now the rationale for privatizing when the private companies are so weak to develop the sector and now rely on government support? The privatization of the power sector was clearly an agenda to exploit Nigerians crudely and keep the people in perpetual darkness.
Nigeria is on the verge of selling unused electricity to four countries in West Africa. What is the sense in selling the product Nigerians have not maximally enjoyed to foreign countries?
The planned sale of electricity to four neighbouring countries is not the problem, the problem however is the undemocratic, corrupt and exploitative manner the sector is being run. Should the power sector be run democratically by workers and consumers and in a planned manner, harnessing the abundant natural (Solar, Wind and Hydro etc.,) and human resources, Nigeria has the capacity to supply affordable and uninterrupted electricity to all Nigerians as well as selling electricity to neighbouring countries at an affordable rate.
One integral part of capitalism is to seek where profit will be best maximize and that explains why exploitation and dominance have to be exported to foreign countries. Hence, the agenda is to mostly target the rich in Nigeria and other countries that can afford the rising and outrageous tariff. For us, working class and poor people in Nigeria and across the world deserve clean, affordable and uninterrupted electricity and it is a fundamental human right.
The World Bank recently gave a damning assessment of the country’s power sector in which it claimed Nigerians are among the people with poorest access to electricity. How did we get to this deplorable state despite huge deposit of gas and other power generation alternatives?
It is not a surprise how Nigeria degenerated in all human index, for a long time, major sectors of the economy were and are still underfunded, the little public funds allocated are mostly looted. Shockingly, 85 million (43% of the population) Nigerians do not have access to grid electricity and with the unfortunate accolade of a country with the largest energy deficit in the world. The capitalist government and the private power companies have shown an obvious lack of capacity to improve electricity let alone guarantee uninterrupted and affordable electricity.
We are still enmeshed in crisis over metering and the National Mass Metering Programme seems not to have lasting solution to same as anticipated. What do you think is the best way to meter Nigerians?
The metering program before privatization and since privatization in 2013 has been run with the agenda to profit from poor consumers when in actual fact metering ought to be issued to every consumer free of charge. Meter is simply a tool for measuring electricity consumption and is never the responsibility of the consumers to procure it. It is the sole obligation of the service providers to issue meters to all consumers at no cost. Given the growing cost of living and poverty, how many people can afford to buy meters at the cost of about N45,000 or N90,000 depending on the phase? Even with the government funding the programme, it is still not sustainable because the Metering programme will be undermined by a lack of adequate funds and corruption in the absence of democratic and transparent control and management by consumers and workers.
The only way out is to return the power sector to public ownership, fund it adequately and for workers and consumers to transparently and democratically manage the sector. This is the only way meters will be made available to all consumers at no cost and guarantee an affordable electricity supply.
There’s intense arguments over privatization Transition Company of Nigeria. What is wrong with the TCN and how do you think it can work optimally to deliver value to Nigerians?
The privatization of the Generating and Distribution aspects of the power sector is now recognized as a disaster, why would any right-thinking person continue on the same road that leads to disaster? Privatization of the Transition Company of Nigeria (TCN) is never a solution, in fact, it will speed up the degeneration of the sector. The agenda is to consolidate the grip of the economy by tiny privileged persons at the expense of the vast majority.
I am aware of the growing worries among Nigerians over perennial darkness on account of epileptic power supply and the increased clamour to review the sector’s privatization. Where has the privatization taken Nigerians 8years and where should be the next phase?
Like I stated before, privatization of the power sector is a failure, the only people who are benefiting are the private power company owners and their partners in government, overwhelmingly, Nigerians have been put in more darkness amidst mostly outrageous and unjust electricity bills.
The only sustainable solution is the reversal of the privatization policy, massive investment in the sector and for the working people (workers and consumers) to manage and control the sector. It is this core socialist programme under a working people government that can rescue the power sector and the Nigerian economy at large.
Should power companies get quoted on the Nigerian Stock Exchange market to raise capital to run their operation?
Quoting the power companies on the Nigerian Stock Exchange to raise capital is not a way out, it is simply an agenda to consolidate the failed privatization programme because it is the government ownership share that will be auctioned off. As long as the agenda is to sustain profiteering and make electricity supply increasingly unaffordable, the country will continue in this unavoidable darkness.
The campaign for energy transition is spreading round the globe and countries are increasing switching to electric cars. Will Nigeria catch the bug given its erratic power supply, what would be our gains and losses?
Talking about that the challenge electric car technology poses for Nigeria is like subjecting a Primary School pupil to WAEC exams. Simple metering is still a problem! As long as we are ruled by a bankrupt bourgeois ruling elite and government, we will continue this monumental backwardness.
Is Nigeria’s power sector challenged by over regulation or under regulation?
The problem is not ‘over regulation’ or ‘under regulation’, it is capitalist exploitation that is aimed at exploiting the people. You cannot give what you do not have, what capitalism offers is exploitation and development can only be guaranteed wherein profit is guaranteed. If profit is not guaranteed, crises and underdevelopment is sustained.