Lucky Obukohwo, Reporting
The Federal Government of Nigeria has revealed plans to source from the private sector, part of the 10 billion dollars required to provide regular electricity across Nigeria within the next five to 10 years.
This formed the crux of the deliberation when the Director General of the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC), Dr. Jobson Oseodion Ewalefoh, paid a courtesy visit to the Minister of Power, Mr. Adebayo Adelabu in Abuja.
The duo agreed that given the funding and technical requirements needed to advance the power sector in Nigeria, it had become imperative to seek private sector input through Public-Private Partnership (PPP) in co-financing and providing expertise that will ensure optimal performance of power infrastructure.
Speaking during the meeting, the Director General of the PPP regulatory body, said that given the importance of power to the economic development of Nigeria, optimising the performance of existing infrastructure as well as funding new ones was necessary.
He acknowledged the challenges in the sector were hydra-headed and went beyond funding alone, adding that with such inter-agency collaboration and partnership with the private sector, the limitations can be addressed.
Reacting to a comment by the Minister, the DG said that through its regulatory processes, the ICRC can midwife private sector investment of part of the $10bn in the power sector to provide regular electricity, attract more foreign direct investment to other sectors, and ultimately grow the economy.
“Revamping the power sector requires planning; it involves investments, and it takes time. So, we need to collaborate to solve the issues in this sector.
“The investment required in power is very huge, and the government cannot fund it alone, so we have to leverage the financing capacity of the private sector. That is why the ICRC was set up to regulate this leverage.
“The Commission is poised to regulate the processes of attracting investment to the power sector.”
He commended the Minister for his vast knowledge of the sector, pointing out that Mr. President’s choice of him was commendable.
Dr Ewalefoh said that in a bid to accelerate PPP investment as directed by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the Commission had issued a 6-point policy direction, which has ultimately streamlined the process of PPP service delivery.
The DG stressed that whereas the processes have been streamlined to accelerate project delivery and encourage investors to adopt PPP, the Commission was not relenting or compromising on its stringent regulatory function to forestall contingent liabilities or unnecessary delays by companies that lack the requisite capacity.
Given the above, the ICRC’s boss said that the Commission was now insisting on inserting conditions precedent to all PPP agreements such that any preferred bidder that defaults will have their agreement automatically nullified because of their default.
In his response, the minister commended the DG for the initiative to visit the ministry with the proposal of advancing investment in the power sector through PPPs.
“For us to achieve 24-hour power supply across Nigeria in the next 5 to 10 years, there is a minimum funding requirement of about 10 billion dollars in the next 10 years.
The government cannot afford that when there are other critical sectors in need of funding.
“Can the government do it alone? No! This is why we have to look for or marshal private sector funds while still retaining government interest and ownership. That is where ICRC comes in.
“We need to do this in collaboration with the private sector, and the best way is through concession”, he said.