[Fair Use: For Educational and Research Purposes Only]

Nigerians Suffer Nationwide Black-out Again

Story Filed: Tuesday, July 18, 2000 7:13 AM EST

LAGOS (July 18) XINHUA - Power supply across Nigeria was cut off on Monday again, causing nationwide outrage, media here reported on Tuesday.

The black-out, the third time this year, was due to problems caused by overloading along two main lines, an official with the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA) was quoted as saying in the country's commercial capital Lagos.

Similar outages early this year had seen former NEPA Managing Director Alhaji Bello and other senior managing officials removed from their posts.

President Olusegun Obasanjo, on sacking these officials, apologized to the nation for the shortcomings of NEPA.

A technical board was then appointed to manage and reform the corporation for future privatization.

According to Minister of Power and Steel Segun Agagu, 100 billion naira (about one billion U. S. dollars) is needed for rehabilitating the dilapidating power grid across the country.

http://library.northernlight.com/FB20000718100000041.html?cb=0&dx=2006&sc=0#doc

-- (Dee360Degree@aol.com), July 18, 2000