Igali told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Thursday that the spate of vandalism on power infrastructure and absence of gas to most power plants was a challenge to stable power supply.
''We are working with the ministry of petroleum, NSCDC and other security services to ensure optimal protection of the power assets. This has made it impossible for us to meet up with the amount of power we thought we will be giving by this time. Vandalism and the non-availability of gas to most of the power plants have affected availability of power,'' he said.
He stressed that the ministry had put in place policy and institutional framework to tackle problems associated with power.
“There are enough policy and institutional framework to deal with these issues,” he said.
Igali said that the main problem confronting the sector currently was the post-privatisation complications.
''All over the world whenever you undertake this type of privatisation, there are post-privatisation issues. The new owners trying to upgrade their assets, developing a market, addressing aggregate and technical losses, ensuring that consumers were taken care of,'' he said.
He said that power was a critical sector of the economy that required enough attention.
''Power being a very critical sector there are many areas of challenge that must be confronted and overcome,'' the permanent secretary said.
He said that activities of some host communities were one of the factors militating against power supply in the country.
''We have told contractors to work with the state governments to talk to the communities on issues of compensation,'' he said.
NAN recalls that some host communities where transmission lines passed through had prevented work on such lines.
- The Ng Guardian
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