Nigeria imported electricity equipment and tools valued at N1.34 trillion ($6. 71 billion) from China and some other countries in the last two years, New Telegraph investigations have revealed.
The equipment include electric switchboards, conductors, power capacitors, power converters, power generation boilers, power generators and electricity meter. Also included are distribution boards, transformers, circuit breakers and disconnects, power plant valves, power storage devices, switchgears, turbines and voltage regulators.
Statistics from the World Trade Organisation (WTO) revealed that some power equipment valued at $2.89 billion were shipped from China to Nigeria between 2014 and 2015.
Others are United Kingdom, $773.8 million; India, $399.1 million; United States of America, $321million; South Africa, $230.3 million; Sweden, $260.4 million and Republic of Korea, $122.5 million.
It was also learnt that some of the equipment, which were imported by the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), have been abandoned and are rusting at the seaports. Worried by the neglect of the poower equipment, in July 2014, the Federal Government secured the release of 248 containers rusting at the Lagos and Tincan Island ports to Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN).
The containers were meant for the Independent Power Project (IPP) and were imported by the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN). Also, in 2011, the PHCN abandoned 250 containers, containing vital equipment to boost power generation in the coun-try.
Of the containers, 140 of them were abandoned at the Ports and Cargo Terminal in Tin Can Port, while 110 containers were moved to Ikorodu terminal as over time cargoes. Also, in 2015, some power equipment in 27 containers were abandoned at the Lagos Port Complex.
The consignments were the remnant of the 69 imported into the country between July and August 2014. A source at a shipping line that ferried the equipment to the port revealed that the consignee of the goods, a Romania firm, Dextron Engineering Company Limited, incurred a demurrage of N100 million on the cargoes.
The company was contracted by TCN to handle power project in Kaduna. The source told this newspaper that the shipping line that allegedly brought the containers to the port had written several letters to TCN to clear the cargoes, but there was no response.
In 2015, Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) asked the transmission companies that took over assets and liabilities of the defunct PHCN to remove their abandoned imported electricity equipment from Ikorodu Lighter Terminal before end of this year or forfeit them to the Federal Government.
According to its Zonal Coordinator in charge of Zone A, Assistant Comptroller-General Eporwei Edike, the electricity equipment imported by the defunct PHCN had been left unclaimed at the terminal in Lagos for years.
He said: “A lot of containers loaded with electricity equipment lying uncleared at the terminal belong to the defunct PHCN. These containers were transferred to Ikorodu from the ports.
Meanwhile, Korea has said that it would focus on its top export market, Nigeria and other four African countries by investing $17.2 billion on electricity between 2016 and 2025.
Already, the trade volume between Nigeria and Korea had exceeded $4.4 billion between 2014 and the first quarter of 2016. The country said that its power company, Korean Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO), would also invest the money on water and electricity in Mozambique, Kenya, Ethiopia and Uganda
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