FG earmarks N16bn for rural electrification

[Mirror]

The Federal Government has earmarked N16 billion to revive rural electrification projects across the country, Minister of State for Power, Hajia Zainab Kuchi, disclosed yesterday.

Kuchi, who said this while re-inaugurating the Rural Electrification Agency, REA, board, said government's target is to achieve 75 per cent rural electrification access by 2020.

She said even though the REA board was in crisis sometime ago, it fully came on board last year, adding that there is adequate funding for all abandoned rural electrification projects across the country.

"REA was scrapped, but it came back on board last year. What happened last year was that there were lots of backlog of payments that the agency was saddled with. There are thousands of abandoned projects we addressed which took us to early this year.

"We went through a lot of processes and we are still battling some. We have been able to identify abandoned projects; we have a list of them. We have plan for proper funding for all abandoned projects. "Even though the projects were abandoned when REA was in crisis, the focus this year even up to next year is the completion of abandoned projects.

The funding for REA was N16 billion this year and that will be used to address the issue of abandoned projects." She urged the newly inaugurated board to imbibe team work in all its approaches, stressing that the board's function is advisory as well as having monitoring and evaluation of projects as priority in the various catchment areas.

Kuchi also charged the new board to focus on the development of Nigerian local content in relation to appropriate technologies for rural electrification skills.

According to the minister, the board's performance indicator would be the number of rural communities' that have access to electricity, the number of investors attracted to the rural electrification subsector, the extent to which information garnered on local technology and its application in rural electrification agency, among others.

Members of the board include Senator Jonathan Zwingina as chairman, Hon. Umar Maude Hiliya, as vice-chairman and Mrs. Blessing Egwu as secretary.

Others are Alhaji Lawan Gara Karasuwa, Senator Davou Zang, Engr. Biola Akinpade, Mr. Ezekiel Aywonya, Dr. Chime Jide, Engr. Sirajo Rufai, Mr. Nuhu Sada, and the Managing Director of Rural Electrification Agency, Engr. Kenneth Achugbu

National Mirror