- …Power Sector ‘Designed for Perpetual Darkness’
BY BONNY AMADI
The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has described the total collapse of the national electricity grid as a deliberate failure engineered by the government and the ruling elite, calling the power sector a system “designed for perpetual darkness.”
In a statement signed by Comrade Joe Ajaero, President of the NLC, and released on Wednesday, the labour union expressed “utter disgust, yet a complete lack of surprise” over the latest grid failure, which it said is part of “the direct and inevitable result of a capitalist ruling class that has deliberately engineered the power sector to fail, to loot, and to keep the Nigerian people in a state of perpetual under-development and exploitation.”
The NLC added that the collapse reflects the consequences of a government that refuses to listen to citizens and civic actors, instead “insisting on kowtowing to the peddlers of neoliberal policies.”
“This latest collapse is a stark indictment of this administration and the entire neoliberal, pro-market charade that has defined the power sector since its so-called privatization,” the union stated.
“The government, hiding behind compromised agencies, has once again demonstrated that it has neither the political will nor the ideological clarity to deliver stable electricity to the masses.”
The labour body insisted the problem is not technical, but structural, saying, “We state categorically that the problem is not a technical one; it is a problem of predatory power sector governance and a kwashiorkor economic model.”
According to the NLC, the sector is run by “a cabal of the wrong individuals; unqualified political cronies, and economic buccaneers who see our national infrastructure not as a tool for development, but as a trough from which to siphon public wealth.”
The union criticized the appointment of a former local government chairman, with no expertise in energy economics or engineering, as Chairman of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), describing it as “not an appointment for competence; it is a political settlement, a reward for loyalty in a system that thrives on patronage at the expense of merit.”
The statement further alleged that this arrangement renders NERC “a toothless bulldog, a mere rubber stamp for the profiteering of the Discos and Gencos.”
Reacting to reports that the government plans to pay N4 trillion to private operators in the sector, the NLC rejected the move outright, calling it “an act of economic betrayal against the Nigerian people.”
The union said, “This colossal sum is not meant to ‘fix’ anything; it is a grand scheme to indemnify failure. This N4 Trillion is more than enough to begin a radical, state driven process of building a new, democratically-controlled power sector from the ground up; a sector owned by the people and run for the people.”
The labour group said the continued failure of the grid is a “direct attack on our national productivity,” noting that it “kills small businesses, stifles industrialization, creates mass unemployment, and inflicts untold hardship on millions of households forced to pay exorbitant tariffs for darkness.”
The NLC outlined measures it says the government must take to restore the sector, emphasizing that leadership appointments should be based on merit rather than politics.
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