Future is brigh for power sector, says group

A RAY of hope may be brewing on the nation’s power sector going by the recent developments, which are poised to herald the exploitation of alternative energy mix and ultimately attract Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) into the country.

The Managing Director, Informa Exhibitions (Middle East and Africa), Peter Hall, who raised hope on the future of Nigeria’s electricity industry during a chart with The Guardian at the on-going Power Nigeria Exhibition and Conference at Eko Hotel, Lagos, said: “We believe the future is bright for Nigeria’s power sector. The Power Nigeria exhibition and conference has shed light on the problems Nigeria is currently facing with the grid and the financing of the power sector. It is clear that with the right investment and government’s desire to improve the standard of power supply, the sector is bound to improve,”

Assessing the industry’s performance after two years of privatising the power sector, Hall said there is no doubt that Nigeria is on the right track and the privatisation scheme has certainly had a positive impact on the power supply with the country hitting its highest generation capacity of 5,000mw earlier in the year.

“However the nation still has a long way to go in its plans and an objective of this scale in this vast country is going to take some time and much more investment still,” he noted.

He said that the country suffers huge generation gap due to over-reliance on gas and the increasing spate of theft and vandalism.