No guarantee there’ll be end to frequent national grid collapse — Power minister

TRIBUNE

The Minister of Power, Mr Adebayo Adelabu, said on Monday that the Federal Government had not found the antidote to the frequent collapse of the National Grid, a development that shut down power supply to the whole country many times in 2024.

He told senators in Abuja that there was no guarantee yet that the system would not continue to crash in 2025, so long as insecurity, vandalism, and poor infrastructure remained the major threats to the grid.

Adelabu, who appeared before the Senate Committee on Power in Abuja on Monday to defend the power sector budget for 2025, also disputed the widely quoted figure that the country’s national grid collapsed 12 times in 2024, representing at least one collapse in each of the 12 months of the year.
Faulting the figure, the minister said the grid collapsed “only eight times and not 12 as always reported.”

He said to achieve a permanent end to grid collapse would require concerted efforts, including tackling insecurity and the frequent vandalism of power infrastructure.

“There is no guarantee that there will be no more grid collapse. What we can do is to make sure that it is minimal and that after a collapse, we rectify it as quickly as possible,” the minister stated.

READ THE FULL STORY IN TRIBUNE