Aso Rock Villa, the official residence of Nigeria’s president is quitting power distribution companies to buy power directly from power generation companies, the Federal Government has said.

Rising from the Federal Executive Council meeting on Wednesday, Babatunde Fashola, minister of Power, Works and Housing said this came as a response to a memorandum his ministry submitted earlier seeking approval to include the Villa in the Distribution Expansion Programme earlier approved by the Council to enable 2,000MW of currently unutilized generation capacity to be distributed to targeted metered customers.

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In a press release issued to media houses on Friday signed by Hakeem Bello, a spokesperson for the ministry, said that approved alongside the Villa project was the final payment for the completion of the Afam 240 MW Power Plant in Rivers State, the construction of Dedicated Solar Power System for the Federal Ministry of Power, Works and Housing Headquarters in Mabushi and the concession of five Hydro Dams to facilitate electricity supply to Rural and Agrarian communities across the country.said top among the approvals.

The Eligible Customer Regulation, which was issued by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) in mid-2017, permits electricity customers to buy power directly from the generation companies in line with the provisions of Section 27 of the Electric Power Sector Reform Act 2005 whereby Eligible Customers are permitted to buy power from a licensee other than electricity distribution companies.

Isaac Anyaogu is an Assistant editor and head of the energy and environment desk. He is an award-winning journalist who has written hundreds of reports on Nigeria’s oil and gas industry, energy and environmental policies, regulation and climate change impacts in Africa. He was part of a journalist team that investigated lead acid pollution by an Indian recycler in Nigeria and won the international prize - Fetisov Journalism award in 2020. Mr Anyaogu joined BusinessDay in January 2016 as a multimedia content producer on the energy desk and rose to head the desk in October 2020 after several ground breaking stories and multiple award wining stories. His reporting covers start-ups, companies and markets, financing and regulatory policies in the power sector, oil and gas, renewable energy and environmental sectors He has covered the Niger Delta crises, and corruption in NIgeria’s petroleum product imports. He left the Audit and Consulting firm, OR&C Consultants in 2015 after three years to write for BusinessDay and his background working with financial statements, audit reports and tax consulting assignments significantly benefited his reporting. Mr Anyaogu studied mass communications and Media Studies and has attended several training programmes in Ghana, South Africa and the United States

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