Electricity supply in Nigeria has always been on the low side ever since i become conscious as a boy in my early years on earth.The exited exclamation of "UP NEPA"that used to charter the air,back then , any time electricity supply was put back after a long time of non-supply is what children still shout whenever electricity is reinstalled,this time around, days after a long absence of electricity.
It is always of concern to me that over a century of existence of Nigeria, 60 out of these years,as an independent state,we are still striving to solve our electricity supply issue.
The government has recently lamented over our spending of over 2.8 trillion one electricity over the past years with no headway in solving our electricity problems.This is shocking,to say the least!
Nigeria has been lingering between about 3500 megawatts and 5000 megawatts electricity generation for sometime now and this often drops to below 2500 megawatts.
South Africa has currently generates about 3500 megawatts and hope to continues to improve on that going forward.
The long and short of this,is that Nigeria with close to 400 million of population,has always fell far short of electricity supply to its population and this carries a lot of negative consequences.
some of this consequences of insufficient electricity supply to Nigeria population includes;
- High cost of manufacture goods in the country due to the high volume and cost of diesel required to operate the generator that power the machines in the production processes in the absence of electricity supply from the national grid.
- We have heard,in some cases of the relocation of manufacturing industries from Nigeria to neighboring countries such as Ghana where electricity seem to be more steady.
- Many jobs that are electricity-related that would have been created and taken up by the teaming unemployed in the country can not also be created because of lack of electricity.
- There is no doubt that the high unemployment rate we presently facing in Nigeria can be drastically reduced with relatively steady supply of electricity.
- Welding workshops, barbing saloon, hair dressing saloon, internet cafe, fashion designers, cold room operator ,laundry operator etc.will all flourish if they have access to steady electricity power supply to run their business flawlessly.most importantly too, manufacturing will once again boom in Nigeria as factories will be able to operates their machines at cheaper electricity rates compared to the huge cost of running them presently on diesel generators,this means that there will be a reduction in the cost of production.
A reduction in the cost of production will also drive the price of produced goods down,thus making them affordable to the average Nigerian. - Lastly our products will be able to compete for export, especially in our immediate Africa market due to low cost of production.this can indeed be the beginning of Nigeria earning serious foreign exchange from exports.Exports earning can improve the strength of the Nair a against stronger currencies like the Dollar and save us from the present foreign exchange mess we find ourselves,Nigerians can then start to breath a sigh of relieve.
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