Any W/bank facility to Discos’ll be diverted to paying bad loans, meaning no light—Expert
Whereas the Federal Government is seeking $5.2bn from the World Bank to expand electricity generation and distribution, an energy consultant, Shaibu Dada has warned that such facility will be diverted into settling existing bad loans which will translate to continued darkness and more debts.
Only last week, the Minister Power, Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola revealed that the major hidden cause of paucity of funds at Discos and some Gencos is that their top managers had given out frivolous loans that are not recoverable in the past that are now holding back their chances of getting bank loans.
Dada argued that many of the Discos have shown that they are not reliable and as such, should be disciplined by way of revoking their concession agreements.
He alleged that why many of the Discos are not willing to give digital meters to Nigerians is to use the estimated billing system to reap off Nigerians and in the process pay off their bad loans.
He said the only company that needs to get the new World Bank facility should those that are not having any form of non-performing loans.
According to Bloomberg report, World Bank’s private-sector lending arm, the International Finance Corporation, may invest about $1.3bn in power projects and electricity distribution companies in the country.
Fashola had revealed that the World Bank’s political-risk insurer, the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, could provide equity and debt of $1.4bn for gas and solar power programmes.
That’s in addition to loans of $2.5bn that Nigeria is seeking from the lender to help improve the distribution of power, expand transmission capacity and increase access to electricity in rural areas, Fashola said.
The Minister also added that “Disbursements with the World Bank are being worked out to start from around June or July this year”.
Business Hilights recalls that Nigeria produces about 4,000 megawatts of power compared with an average peak generation of about 35,000 megawatts in South Africa, with a population that’s less than a third of the size of Nigeria’s 180 million people.
