The Ministries of Power, Finance, and the Bureau of Public Enterprise (BPE) have been directed by President Muhammadu Buhari to conclude the nation’s engagement with Siemens AG over regular power supply.
The directive, made available on Wednesday via the Presidency’s Twitter handle, was to start the pre-engineering and concessionary financing aspects of the Presidential Power Initiative (PPI).
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The PPI is a power infrastructure upgrade and modernization Programme agreed to by the Federal Government and Siemens AG of Germany, with the support of the German Government.
According to the Federal Government, the aim of the initiative is to modernize and increase the Nigerian electricity grid capacity from about 5 GW currently to 25 GW, over three phases.
Nigeria, Under the PPI, will, on behalf of the other shareholders in the Electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos), invest in infrastructure upgrades in the form of improved payment systems, distribution substations, transformers, protection devices, smart meters, and transmission lines among others.
According to the statement, President Buhari has approved the release of funding for the first part of Phase 1 of the PPI, to kick-off the pre-engineering and concession
To ensure fairness and transparency of the intervention, the President has also directed that the nation engage the International Finance Corporation (‘IFC’) to assist in developing the commercial structure of the intervention.
The President has also directed that to ensure value for money and preserve the integrity & transparency of the procurement process under the Govt-to-Govt framework, Siemens AG shall be solely responsible for nominating its EPC partners to perform all onshore works; NO middlemen.
Our goal is simply to deliver electricity to Nigerian businesses and homes… Our intention is to ensure that our cooperation is structured under a Govt-to-Govt framework. No middlemen will be involved so that we can achieve value for money for Nigerians.
In the meantime, Nigeria commenced the project on August 31, 2018, when German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, alongside a business delegation, including the Global CEO Siemens, visited Nigeria and met with President Buhari.
