By Amaka Agwuegbo
Energy generation is crucial to any economy as there can be no economic growth without power supply. Spurred by this, successive Nigerian governments have promised to improve power generation, and though several millions is being claimed to have been invested to generate more megawatts, millions of Nigerians continue to live in darkness.

A woman electrician:

The installed generating capacity in Nigeria is about 4,000MW, but the present electric energy output for the country is less than 3,000MW, a quantity that is insufficient for Lagos State alone. With more residents resorting to generating plants as major sources of power supplies, there is need for routine services and maintenance to keep the power generating sets in order.

Decked in her dirty coveralls, Mrs. Busola Oyebadejo, a Masters holder from the University of Lagos and Managing Director of Power-Gen Engineering Limited, an alternative power solutions company, was seen doing what she has grown to love doing – providing alternative power supply to people.

According to Busola, her interest in engines and electrical installations has earned her the nickname ‘Madam Power’ or ‘Power to the people’.

“I worked in a power generating company for almost 15 years and picked interest in electrical installations and working with engines, machines and the likes.

Though people are naturally taken aback when they see a woman doing such dirty and tedious jobs in a male dominated sector, Busola is not intimidated as she has learnt to become a man when on the job.

“The first time I serviced an engine for some clients, I did it so well that they were impressed since it was their first time of having a female provide such services for them. I was overjoyed at the results and it has propelled me to be more involved hands-on in the job.

“The major challenge I have is that people think l am a sales representative, so they tend not to believe that I can offer anything, making me to continually prove myself to prospective clients, especially when you have to get dirty as a woman to do the job.

“Also, in order not to be taken advantage of by the men I work with, I operate like a man when on the job. This makes them to know that though I’m a woman, but can be tough when the occasion calls for it.

“Another challenge that has been of great concern to my family is working late into the nights and the frequent travels that come with the job. But my passion for fixing engines and servicing generators makes me to consider them non-issues.”

Though Power-Gen is into the supply, installation and maintenance of generating sets, rural electrification, sale and installation of transformers, it recently opened into the solar energy market with supplies and installations.

But, one is wont to ask: with a population of over 140 million people, how much energy do we really need in Nigeria? To answer this questions, one will need to compare our per capital production of electrical energy with countries like United States of America and South Africa. USA is producing over 570 billion KWH and South Africa 200 billion.

If Nigeria were to produce electricity at the USA rate of 12.7 bilion KWH per million people, then with a population of 140 million people, we should be generating 174,000MW of electricity. We still have a very long way to go.

Many factories and businesses have closed down as a result of the high cost of running generating sets, and this has led and is still leading to mass lay-off of workers and subsequently increasing the rate of unemployment and insecurity in the country. Many people have equally lost their lives as a result of inhaling the fumes from the generating sets as each household, market, etc, has turned to power generating units to cope with the bad situation.

Despite the viability of the power business due to the epileptic power supply currently being experienced in the country, Busola sounded that her major reason for doing what she does is to firstly provide solutions to people’s power problems.

“In as much as we are making profit, we are taking advantage of the opportunity provided by the state of public power supply and are providing light to people. If, tomorrow the situation becomes better, we hope to have an independent power plant because we want to encourage people to go green.

“The truth is that we can’t be out of business with the improvement in public power supply because people will still have engines to be serviced and maintained and they will still need transformers which will also be maintained
“The business is quite profitable and we have a good number of patrons who want that feminine touch in the services rendered.”

On her family’s acceptance of her line of business, she says “When I informed them of what I wanted to do, they thought I was nuts; but have come to accept me and my job to the extent of calling me ‘Power to the people’ or ‘Madam Power’, which is okay with me.”

Not resting on her oars, and knowing that the privatization of the power sector by the Federal Government is imminent, in five years, Busola hopes to grow PowerGen into an independent power provider just in case the government is able to provide adequate public power supply to her citizens.