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President Tinubu appeals for patience as FG audits ₦4 trillion owed power generators
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Liquidity crisis blamed on 10 years of unpaid tariffs, unfunded subsidies
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N1.8 trillion validated so far; debt may shrink after full verification
President Bola Tinubu has appealed to electricity generation companies (GenCos) for more time to verify and validate the ₦4 trillion legacy debt owed them by the federal government, promising transparency and accountability in resolving the matter.
Speaking during a high-level meeting with representatives of the GenCos at the Presidential Villa in Abuja, Tinubu acknowledged the inherited liabilities and said they must be resolved credibly and lawfully. The meeting was led by Col. Sani Bello (rtd), and a statement by presidential aide Mr Bayo Onanuga quoted the President as saying:
“I accept the assets and liabilities of my predecessors, and there is no question about that. But that acceptance must be on credible grounds. I need to wear the audit cap of verifiability, authenticity, and the fact that this inheritance is not a mere deodorant but a support structure for critical economic and industrial promotion.”
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Tinubu stressed that the administration is deploying audit and legal experts to verify GenCos’ claims, assuring the companies that only legitimate obligations would be honoured.
Also speaking, the President’s Special Adviser on Energy, Mrs Olu Verheijen, revealed that a ₦4 trillion Federal Government bond programme has received anticipatory approval from the President as a framework to settle the debt, pending final validation.
According to her, the staggering debt arose from over a decade of “unfunded tariff shortfalls and market failures,” and that verified exposure has now reached ₦4 trillion as of April 2025. She confirmed that NBET, the government agency responsible for managing the power market interface, has validated ₦1.8 trillion out of the total claims so far.
Verheijen warned that the final sum is subject to downward adjustment:“Only the amounts that the federal government validly owes are the things that will make it into the issuance by the DMO.”
Minister of Power, Mr Adebayo Adelabu, commended Tinubu for his intervention and urged him to defray part of the debts immediately to prevent a shutdown of electricity generation assets.
“Given the grave implications of this debt overhang, I humbly seek your immediate support for defraying these obligations, even if partially, over a defined period,” the minister stated.
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In his remarks, billionaire investor Mr Tony Elumelu, speaking on behalf of the private sector, appealed for urgent action, warning that generating companies are under threat of foreclosure due to unpaid loans:
“We’ve come to you as a last hope. The generating companies are heavily indebted to banks, and foreclosure threats are real, not because we’re not doing our jobs, but because the system owes us trillions.”
Elumelu praised Tinubu’s leadership for restoring oil production and banking confidence, but warned that without resolving the power crisis, national transformation will stall.
“We don’t need power to complete your transformation; we need power to enable it.”
He urged Tinubu to use the same resolve deployed in the oil sector to fix the electricity deadlock.
