By Chris Ochayi

ABUJA – The Federal Government has commissioned the $6 million Karu Transmission sub-station with a call on the beneficiaries of the new facility to be vigilante and take necessary steps to ensure the safety of the installation.

The Minister of Power, Prof. Chinedo Nebo, who made the appeal while commissioning the facilities at Karu, a suburb in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, said government was worried by the avalanche of vandalism of electricity facilities across the country.

The contract for the new 2X60MVA, 123/33kv transmission sub-station project was awarded to a consortium of Shreem-Jyoti-MBH Power Engineering at the cost of $6.07 million, which was funded from $172 million World Bank‘s grant to Nigeria under the National Energy Development Project, NEDP.

The minister told the Karu residents and its environs that the power installations belong to them and therefore, they should protect them from the activities of vandals.

He said that Government is partnering with security agents to effectively check the menace of vandalism, adding that the beneficiaries have a vital role to play in protecting the installations, saying: “Protect what is yours because nobody will come and take it from you.”

Describing the facility as life-changing, important and significant in more ways than one to the people, the minister noted that, “For the large and highly industrious population of Karu, Mararaba and environs, the epileptic nature of power supply became a familiar but tortuous experience over the years. But change has come.

“With today’s commissioning, the transmission inadequacy in Karu area has been squarely addressed, more so with the upgrading of the over-stretched 33KV transmission line all the way from Apo transmission substation to the current 132KV line at the door step to reduce technical losses. Also, the hitherto inadequate 30MVA power transformer capacity has now been upgraded to 120MVA to accommodate the higher load demand forecast in Vision 20:2020.

“This project will certainly act as a catalyst for the development of small and medium scale businesses, promoting industrial growth in these areas, and subsequently impacting positively on the well-being and overall living standards of individual families,” he said.

Nebo explained further that Karu, Mararaba, Nyanya, Masaka, Jikwoi, Karshi and neighbouring parts of Nasarawa State will now enjoy about 15 to 18 hours quality supply of electricity daily, as against the previously unpredictable supply patterns.

“I wish to announce that, by the grace of God, this new experience of residents of Karu and environs are just a taste of the new lifestyle that the transformation Agenda of President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan is ushering in, for urban dwellers as well as the large population in the rural areas.

“Let me seize this opportunity to intimate you with Government’s plan to stimulate development of renewable and alternative energy for rural electrification and farm clusters by exploring these energy sources for viability in producing electricity.

“For each rural community, the Ministry of Power will implement micro-off grid wind or solar powered lighting systems to light up homes, community common areas or centres and major inlet/outlet roadways into communities. This scheme will provide access to electricity to the rural areas with distributed or low capacity, few kilowatts, solar or wind-powered energy-efficient lighting systems in two phases, by the end of 2014.

“Concrete results are beginning to manifest from the tireless work of all stakeholders in the electricity industry, especially in the past two years of the Jonathan administration.

We must give Mr. President the credit for making power a cardinal point of his transformation agenda, and for launching and proactively driving the Power Sector Reform Roadmap.

“Evidence that the reforms are working is also seen in the success story of the ambitious power sector privatisation exercise, the largest and most transparent so far in Africa, the sustenance of generation and distribution infrastructure ahead of privatisation, even in the face of zero budget provision in the current year, and the peaceful resolution of labour issues, among other things.

“Acutely aware of the need to brace up to evacuate the expected huge volume of power to be generated in the coming weeks and months, we have since activated the contract with Manitoba of Canada, for the management of the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), and we are also consciously and consistently strengthening transmission infrastructure across the country,” he said.

In his remarks earlier, the Managing Director of Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN, Mr. Don Priestman, said the project since completion has impacted positively on the socio-economic and infrastructural developments of the benefiting communities.

He added that the Karu Transmission sub-station project is of many projects that have been successfully executed by this administration in its determination to ensure implementation of the power sector reform agenda.

According to him, “as the Federal Government continues to work towards expanding the power sector, I enjoin every citizen of this great country to join hands with us in protecting all electricity installations from the activities of vandals.”