Blackout in Northern States: Sack Power Minister, Adelabu - Nigerians to Tinubu

Nigerians have called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to sack the Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu, as an outage lingers for 11 days in Northern Nigerian states.

The President of the Nigeria Consumer Protection Network, Kunle Olubiyo, and the Lead Director of the Centre for Social Justice, Eze Onyekpere, disclosed this in separate interviews on Monday.

The call for Adelabu's sack comes days after Tinubu reshuffled his cabinet over incessant national grid collapses in Nigeria.

The North East and North West regions of Nigeria have been wallowing in darkness since October 21, 2024.

The region, representing at least 15 states in Nigeria, has been facing the situation after insurgents vandalised the Shiroro-Kaduna transmission line.

In a statement, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Monday charged the Minister of Power, Adelabu, and the responsible agency to restore supply to the region, but darkness persists as of the time of filing this report.

Adelabu, on his part, said power would be restored to the region within five days.

This comes after days of assurance of temporary power restoration by the Transmission Company of Nigeria.

TCN had consistently assured that power would be temporarily restored through the Ugwuaji APIR 330kV Line; however, citizens in the region still await power restoration as they count their losses economically.

Earlier, it was reported that the office of the National Security Adviser vowed to coordinate other security agencies to ensure the repair of the Shiroro-Kaduna vandalised transmission line.

Eleven-Day of Blackout in Northern Nigerian States National embarrassment: Olubiyo

Speaking on Monday, Olubiyo said the blackout in Northern Nigeria is a national embarrassment.

He called for an emergency in the power sector.

He advocated that the country's national grid should be decentralised into ten industrial hubs to ensure efficiency.

According to him, institutional corruption has crippled TCN, permeated by inefficiency.

Consequently, Olubiyo called for the suspension of the Minister of Power, TCN managing director, Sule Abdulaziz, to give room for a proper investigation into the sector.

"This is a national embarrassment to Nigeria. The president should not treat this with levity.

"Over 10 days without power supply in the Northern region is what constitutes a declaration of state of emergency in the sector.

"The blackout is demarketing the government. We had raised issues on emergency procurement by TCN without bearing or impact on the grid. There is institutional capture and corruption in the sector. Because all the loans collected to improve the industry are nowhere to be funded.

"If there is no proper investment in the sector, we cannot expect to have results in the power sector.

"There is a need to decentralise the grid into ten industrial regions. The problem of the industry is purely corruption and institutional inefficiency.

"We are saying that this should not continue. Whoever is at the helm of affairs, Mr. President should ask them to step aside for proper investigation. Whether it is the Minister of Power or the Managing Director of TCN, they should step aside.

"It is a national embarrassment that deserves a presidential fiat," he said.

Sack Adelabu, others - Onyekpere

On his part, Eze Onyekpere said that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu should relieve Adelabu of his duty as the Minister of Power.

According to him, the persistent outage in the northern region of Nigeria would have been nipped in the bud by the country's emergency response team.

He blamed the situation on the incompetency of Nigerian security chiefs and the Minister of Power, Adelabu.

"It is not surprising; there is a general security failure in Nigeria. The vandalization of the transmission line did not just happen overnight but was planned by terrorists.

"The expectation is that the government ought to be up to speed in tackling insecurity. There would be a quick response strategy on the part of the government to respond to the situation because an outage should not be allowed to happen above 10 days.

"It is a failure on the security and the minister of power, Adebayo Adelabu. He should be sacked. I am surprised he is still the minister.

"It is incompetence on the part of the security agencies and the Minister, that is why there is a power outage in the northern region," he stated.

FG working to restore electricity to the Northern region soon - Adelabu's Spokesperson

Meanwhile, Tunji Bolaji, the spokesperson to the Minister of Power, Adelabu, reacting to the development in an interview on Monday, said that the federal government, through TCN and NSA, is working to restore power supply to the region soon.

Although he did not state exactly when electricity will be restored to the region, he hinted that TCN engineers are on top of the situation.

"We are working day and night to ensure that power is restored to the Northern region.

"If you look at TCN remarks on the matter, there is ongoing work to ensure temporary bulk supply is restored to the region.

"We have to enlighten our people; they should guard government infrastructures from being vandalized. The vandals live within the community.

"This will help, together with what the federal government is doing to protect critical infrastructure.

"The Minister of Power already spoke with the office of the National Security Adviser, the Chief of Army Staff, to ensure security in electricity infrastructures".

Residents of Kaduna and other parts of Northern Nigeria cried out that the blackout had totally grounded businesses in the region.

The outage comes amid struggle with the high price of Premium Motor Spirit (Petrol), which increased to over N1,030 per litre in recent times.

With Nigeria's inflation at 32.70 percent in September and the rising prices of goods and services occassioned by the fuel price hike and Naira floating, citizens wonder where lines the next plague.

The call for Adelabu's sack come days after Tinubu reshuffled his cabinet over incessant national grid collapses in Nigeria.