By Mukhtar Sagir Dambatta
Former Managing Director, Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), Abubakar Atiku Tambuwal, has called for stronger political action and major investment to address persistent electricity challenges in Sokoto and Zamfara.
Tambuwal made the call in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja, stressing that electricity should become a major political and development priority in the affected states.
He said Sokoto and Zamfara remained among the states facing serious challenges due to weak transmission infrastructure, inadequate substations and unreliable electricity supply.
According to him, Sokoto is the only state in the country with just one 132/33kV substation.
“Where are our Senators? Where are our Members of the House of Representatives? Where are our Governors and other political leaders?” he asked.
Tambuwal said political leaders in the region should collectively demand major Federal Government investment in electricity infrastructure.
He said the solution was not the distribution of a few transformers or issuing statements whenever electricity supply became poor.
“What we need is 330kV transmission lines and substations, additional transformers, and reliable distribution networks to solve this recurrent electricity problem,” he said.
He also urged Sokoto, Kebbi and Zamfara states to take advantage of the amended Electricity Act, which allows states to participate in electricity generation, transmission and distribution through appropriate licensing and regulatory arrangements.
Tambuwal said none of the three states had demonstrated sufficient commitment by establishing their electricity regulatory commissions to drive the process.
He said continued dependence on the national grid would leave the states vulnerable to failures and limitations within the system.
On the current situation, Tambuwal said Zaria had been transferred from the 132kV Mando-Zaria line to the 132kV Kano-Zaria line to enable supply from Sokoto to Birnin Kebbi, although only about 10 megawatts could be made available.
He said the development could result in heavy load shedding in Sokoto, while Birnin Kebbi and Niamey in Niger Republic could also experience complete loss of supply.
Tambuwal also called attention to a nearly completed 38MW independent power project (IPP) in Sokoto State, which he said had been abandoned after reaching more than 90 per cent completion.
He said the project could provide relief to the state during outages from the national grid if the state government took steps to complete and utilise it.
The former TCN managing director urged political leaders and state governments in the region to move beyond short-term responses and pursue sustainable investments that would improve electricity supply and support economic development.
He said electricity should not only become a political issue whenever the lights went off but should remain a sustained development priority for the region. (NAN)
