Nigeria’s ongoing electricity supply issues have been worsened by infrastructure destruction in the north.
“Up NEPA” is a Nigerian phrase passed down through generations, succinctly capturing the irony of irregular electricity supply in an energy-rich country.
If you hear this phrase anywhere in Africa’s most populous nation, it can only mean one thing: for now, the familiar torment of power outages has ended.
This term, an acronym for the defunct National Electric Power Authority, features prominently in director and screenwriter Ishaya Bako’s 2024 documentary of the same name. The film delves into the history of electricity in the West African nation and portrays the struggles of 200 million people trying to reconcile with this chronic instability.
Recently, terrorist attacks on transmission lines supplying northern Nigerian states plunged half the country into darkness for nearly a week.
This incident not only brought lives and businesses in the region to a standstill but also underscored a daily reality experienced across the nation.
Numbers Don’t Lie
Nigeria ranks tenth globally in proven oil reserves and eighth in proven natural gas reserves.
