… the problem is deeper: it is systemic misalignment
By Engr. Adeolu Taiwo, FNSE
Electricity remains one of Nigeria’s most strategic challenges. Public debates often focus on distribution companies (DisCos) as the “weakest link” in the value chain.
However, my experience as a field engineer and now as a technical enforcer with the Nigerian Electricity Management Services Agency (NEMSA) has shown me that the problem is deeper: it is systemic misalignment.
Our challenge is not simply about DisCos, but about how transmission capacity, urban and rural planning, tariffs, quality of materials, policy formulation, regulation, and enforcement all fail to align.
Unless these pieces are reconnected, sustainable and reliable electricity will remain elusive.
The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) plays a crucial role in determining the amount of power DisCos can actually deliver.
Many of TCN’s substations are either:
Overloaded, limiting their ability to evacuate generated power; or
Underutilized, due to poor network design, lack of redundancy, or bottlenecks in connecting lines.
This mismatch means that even where DisCos are willing to supply power, transmission constraints prevent delivery at the right time, period, or location.
The result is selective supply, frequent load rejection, and frustrated customers who often blame only the DisCos.
Without correcting evacuation corridors and fully optimizing transmission assets, no tariff reform or DisCo investment can achieve lasting results.
Electricity infrastructure cannot exist outside proper urban and rural planning. Yet Nigeria continues to expand cities and towns with little attention to corridors for power evacuation and distribution.
1. Commercial properties, residential estates, and industrial clusters are often located side by side without structured energy mapping.
2. Land Use Act implementation is weak, leaving no provision for future substations, feeders, or right-of-way corridors.
3. As a result, DisCos are left improvising, trying to serve complex loads with infrastructure that was never planned for such mixed demand.
This poor planning undermines forecasting.
Without accurate demand forecasting, you cannot expand responsibly, protect infrastructure, or deliver sustainably.
Here lies a critical role for the Ministry of Power: coordinating with urban planners, state governments, surveyor-general offices, ministries of environment, and the built industry to ensure energy corridors are integrated into master plans
from the outset.
The recent Band A–E tariff model is built on a logical principle: customers with better service reliability pay more.
However, its full intention cannot be achieved under current conditions.
Where urban planning is weak, it is difficult to isolate customers into distinct reliability bands.
Transmission bottlenecks mean that even Band A customers may not always receive consistent power.
Customers in B and D or E zones may feel unfairly penalized, not because DisCos are unwilling, but because infrastructure corridors were never planned for equitable distribution.
For tariffs to work, they must be backed by a planning framework that ensures each band’s reliability promise can be fulfilled.
Beyond Band A–E, Nigeria should gradually adopt time-of-use tariffs, which encourage load shifting, reduce peak stress, and give customers real choice.
Too often, operational responses focus on short-term fixes rather than long-term asset protection.
For instance, in an attempt to curb energy theft, some DisCos install meters outdoors in IP54-rated enclosures.
While this may temporarily reduce tampering, it exposes meters to weather, vandalism, and premature failure.
Such short-sighted measures increase replacement costs and undermine customer trust.
Infrastructure must be planned for durability, security, and centralized monitoring.
Protecting assets is as important as billing customers.
One overlooked factor in Nigeria’s power crisis is the quality of materials and equipment.
Substandard cables, transformers, meters, and accessories, often imported or distributed without adequate certification, contribute to failures, fires, and unsafe networks.
This is where NEMSA’s enforcement mandate becomes critical.
Beyond inspection of networks and certification of installations, NEMSA must expand stakeholder engagement with vendors and manufacturers:
Vendors must be part of the technical conversation, not just the commercial supply chain.
Every material entering Nigeria’s power market should meet safety and performance standards.
Enforcement should be complemented with awareness, so operators and customers alike understand the risks of substandard products.
By engaging vendors as partners in safety, the sector can protect infrastructure, reduce losses, and improve public confidence.
For sustainable electricity delivery, policy, regulation, and enforcement must not work in silos:
Ministry of Power (Policy Formulation): Provides direction, integrates land use with energy planning, and coordinates with other ministries and state governments.
To make sound decisions, the Ministry relies on verifiable data from NEMSA, field reports, and compliance records that
reveal the true state of the network.
In this sense, NEMSA acts as the Ministry’s “police” in the industry, providing the evidence base for policy
adjustments.
NERC (Regulator): Issues orders, sets tariffs, and ensures market rules.
But regulatory orders must be informed by technical realities.
By integrating NEMSA’s enforcement reports into its decision-making, NERC can ensure tariffs and service standards are grounded in actual field conditions.
NEMSA (Enforcer): Certifies installations, enforces standards, and blocks substandard materials.
Its role is not punitive but collaborative, ensuring safety and efficiency across the value chain.
This feedback loop, NEMSA providing data, the Ministry shaping policy, and NERC regulating based on verified compliance, creates a governance structure where decisions are evidence-based, safe, and investor-friendly.
The truth is that no single actor can fix Nigeria’s electricity sector.
It is not about DisCos alone; it is about weak coordination across the value chain:
Transmission (TCN): Must expand corridors, upgrade overloaded substations, and optimize underutilized ones.
Distribution (DisCos): Must align technical realities with commercial strategies and protect assets for the long term.
Ministry of Power: Must integrate energy planning with urban development, land use, and inter-ministerial collaboration
NERC (Regulator): Must align orders and tariffs with field realities, drawing from NEMSA’s compliance reports.
NEMSA (Enforcer): Must ensure technical compliance, block substandard materials, and provide verifiable data for policy and regulation.
Nigeria’s path to sustainable electricity must rest on three pillars:
1. Planning Integration: Energy forecasting, urban development, and land use must be aligned, with corridors mapped into every estate or industrial cluster.
2. Transmission Optimization: TCN must urgently address underutilized substations, expand lines, and improve redundancy.
3. Collaborative Enforcement: Regulators, enforcers, and policymakers must engage as collaborators, with NEMSA’s reports serving as the technical conscience of the sector.
When these elements converge, DisCos will be able to deliver more reliably, tariffs will reflect real service, and customers will regain trust.
Nigeria’s electricity sector is not broken because of one weak link; it struggles because the links are not coordinated.
With a systems approach, anchored on policy, regulation, and enforcement integration, the promise of safe, reliable, and sustainable electricity can become a reality.
