Reported by Ariajegbe Sylvia Esezobor
The Federal Government has admitted that Nigeria's electricity sector is constrained across the entire value chain, with the Minister of Power, Joseph Tegbe, disclosing that a diagnosis conducted since he assumed office in June 2026 revealed deep-seated problems at every stage of the supply chain, from gas supply and generation to transmission and distribution.
Speaking on Monday in Abuja at a media parley marking his first 100 days in office, Tegbe said the challenges were interconnected and could not be solved by simply adding new generation capacity. "Upon assuming office, the diagnosis we undertook at the onset revealed constraints at every segment of the electricity value chain," he said. "Gas supply to power stations was limited by damaged pipelines and commercial terms that discouraged investment. Our generation fleet was heavily dependent on thermal plants, with ageing equipment, deferred maintenance, stalled projects and capacity unable to reach consumers. The sector diagnosis revealed payment of only 27 per cent of generation companies' bills, undermining their ability to maintain plants and pay gas suppliers".
The minister's assessment painted a picture of a sector trapped in a self-reinforcing cycle of failure. He said transmission infrastructure was under pressure from vandalised towers and lines, overstretched equipment and frequent system tripping, while distribution companies were recording aggregate technical, commercial and collection losses of between 30 and 40 per cent, worsened by inadequate metering, estimated billing, damaged assets and weak payment discipline. He also disclosed that arrears owed by ministries, departments and agencies had exceeded N100 billion, while inflation and foreign exchange pressures had raised operating costs across the market. "These problems reinforce one another," Tegbe said. "Unpaid bills weaken gas supply and maintenance; unreliable supply depresses collections; poor collections deepen debt. A new power station cannot, by itself, resolve that cycle".
The minister ruled out any immediate increase in electricity tariffs, saying the government was focused on improving supply and strengthening the financial and physical foundations of the power sector rather than imposing additional costs on consumers. "We have no plan to increase electricity tariffs. There is no immediate plan by this government to increase tariff. It is not on our table; it is not on our agenda," he said. The clarification followed reports that the government planned to phase out electricity subsidies from 2027, which had triggered concerns of a tariff hike.
Instead of raising tariffs, Tegbe said the government had raised an estimated N1.23 trillion through a bond programme to settle the backlog of debts in the power sector, part of a wider effort to address an estimated N3.3 trillion in sector debt that has constrained investment and weakened utility balance sheets. The bond issuance was executed under the Presidential Power Sector Debt Reduction Programme, which authorises the issuance of up to N4 trillion in government-backed bonds to clear legacy arrears owed to generation companies and gas suppliers. The programme began with a N590 billion Series 1 Power Sector Bond in December 2025, followed by an additional N729 billion bond in July 2026.
The minister said the diagnosis was the necessary first step before any meaningful intervention could be designed. He said his first 100 days, covering June 8 to September 16, had largely focused on diagnosing the problems across the electricity value chain, stabilising existing infrastructure and restoring market discipline. "When President Bola Ahmed Tinubu entrusted me with the responsibility of serving as Minister of Power, I made four promises to Nigerians. I promised a disciplined approach to solving the sector's problems. I promised to pursue grid stability through structured, strategic reforms. I promised visible incremental improvements," he said.
On the gains recorded so far, Tegbe disclosed that electricity generation and transmission had remained above 5,000 megawatts over the past couple of weeks, compared with the 3,700MW to 4,700MW range before June 2026. A generation peak of 5,330MW was recorded between August and September. He said the 375MW Alaoji open-cycle power plant had been restored to the national grid after three years offline, while new transformers commissioned at Apapa, Ijora, Alausa and Lekki in Lagos had unlocked 672MW of transmission capacity. A new 300MVA transformer energised at Katampe, Abuja, had unlocked another 240MW. The Transmission Company of Nigeria had also secured the release of more than 300 containers of critical power equipment held up at the ports.
Tegbe, however, acknowledged that the improvements had not translated into reliable electricity for all communities. "Our next task is to sustain these gains and translate them into more dependable supply at customer level. We are aware that a national peak alone cannot describe the experience of every community," he said. He also disclosed that the government was intensifying efforts to address estimated billing and improve revenue collection through metering, which would ensure consumers are charged based on measured electricity consumption.
The minister's admission of systemic failure across the value chain comes amid heightened public frustration over electricity supply, which remains erratic for millions of Nigerians despite repeated government promises. The Electricity Act 2023, signed by President Tinubu, introduced a decentralised framework that empowers states to establish their own electricity markets and regulatory commissions, but implementation has been slow and uneven. The grid's fragility was underscored in September 2026 when a nationwide outage left homes and businesses in darkness for hours. The government's decision to prioritise debt settlement over tariff adjustment signals a recognition that the sector's problems cannot be solved by simply passing costs to consumers, but it also raises questions about how long the current subsidy arrangement can be sustained without a comprehensive overhaul of the market's financial architecture.
For the minister, the diagnosis is complete, but the treatment has only just begun. His message to Nigerians was one of measured realism: the problems are decades old, and fixing them will take time. "It is difficult to fix a 50-year problem in 24 hours," he said. Whether the incremental gains he has outlined will accumulate into a system that delivers reliable power to every Nigerian remains the central test of his tenure, and the N1.23 trillion bond programme represents the government's most significant financial commitment yet to breaking the cycle of unpaid bills, weak supply and rising debt that has defined the sector for a generation.
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