Adebayo Adelabu, the minister of power, has called on the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE) to support the power sector to achieve the desired goal of steady supply.
Mr Bolaji Tunji, Special Assistant on Media to the Minister, made this known in a statement in Abuja on Saturday.
Tunji said that the minister spoke while receiving a delegation of the NSE, led by its President, Tasiu Sa’ad Gidari-Wudil, on a visit to the ministry.
He said that Adelabu also charged the NSE to throw its weight behind the power sector in order to achieve its desired goal.
“One of the major challenges in the country is the inability to synergise,” Tunji quoted the minister as saying.
The minister said that the power sector was the energy Nigeria needs for economic growth and Industrial development.
According to him, Nigeria is a nation with population of over 220 million, generating only 4,000 megawatt of electricity, so this calls for adequate collaboration with the new administration for sustainable and adequate power supply.
”The sector needs to be given appropriate focus and attention,” the minister said, adding “there is no transformed economy throughout the world that did not put power as priority.
”Another major crisis Nigeria experienced was not being able to produce what is consumed but by being dependent on other parts of the world as a consuming economy.
“A large percentage of what we consume as a nation is imported and any country desirous of transformation should eschew such scenario,” he said.
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”Nigeria needs abundance of power supply and the challenge doesn’t lie on any other institution other than the NSE,” he said.
Adelabu said that factors like leadership, commitment, focus, and passion, are instrumental to achieving the desired success in the power sector.
The minister said that part of President Bola Tinubu’s commitment to change the lives of Nigerians, was the implementation of the local content in government contracts.
“As a protagonist of local content, there must be recognition of the local meter manufacturers in Nigeria to encourage development and sustainability,” he said.
According to him, consumers are the revenue determinants therefore transmission and distribution capacity should be in excess as power generated but does not get to the doorstep of the consumers is a fruitless effort.
“There have been a series of Bilateral stakeholders’ consultations prior to a planned town-hall meeting of all stakeholders which the NSE will be majorly involved,” he said.
Earlier, the President of the NSE, Gidari-Wudil, said that the society will put all expertise and operational requirements at its disposal to help the ministry achieve its mandate.
Gidari-Wudil said that the core mandate of the NSE was to make meaningful contributions to the development and advancement of technology through collaboration and linkages.
He said that the quest for expanding the views and vision of the society across international boundaries, led to the NSE approval of five international diaspora branches.
This is with a view to harnessing vital international resources, knowledge sharing and transfer.
The international branches are in Houston, London, Manchester, Glasgow and the Eastern region of Saudi Arabia.
”The incoming President of the World Society of Engineers is a top member of the NSE,” he said.
The NSE president said that power was the bedrock of manufacturing and for the country to survive, there is the need to support local manufacturers, otherwise Nigeria will continue to be a consuming nation.
“Part of this administration’s mandate is for us to be more of a producing nation,” he added.
