Minister of Power Speaks
By Halimah Olamide
There is relief across the country on Thursday after electricity was restored following about 18 hours of total blackouts.
NPO Reported earlier that the National grid had collapsed leading to a nationwide blackout.
The collapse had happened at about 12:40am.
Some of the electricity distribution companies had informed their customers of a national grid failure.
Minister of Power, Chief Adebayo Adelabu, who is far away in Korea, attributed the collapse to a fire in Niger state.
“The fire has been fully arrested and over half of the connections are now up and the rest will be fully restored in no time,” Adelabu said in a statement.
NPO Reported earlier that Power generation fell to zero in the early hours but had risen to 1,341 megawatts (MW) by 1400 GMT, still well below the daily average of 4,100 MW, data from the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) showed.
Last year Nigeria suffered four times from similar system failures throwing the country into darkness.
Authorities said they are working to prevent such disruptions again in the future.