World Bank Puts Nigeria As Country With The Least Access To Electricity, FG Debunks Report.

Nigeria now the country with the least access to electricity in the world.

According to a report released by the World Bank last week, Nigeria has surpassed The Republic of Congo, to have the highest number of people in the world with no access to electricity.

In a presentation on the 21st of April, Ashish Khanna, who's the World Bank's GPM for West and Central African Energy, disclosed the statistics. According to the report, Nigeria has 85 million people with no access to electricity, about 40% of its entire population, which is the largest number in the world.

“Nigeria now has 25% more unelectrified people than the 2nd most unelectrified country (DRC – in absolute terms). For the bottom, 40% of the population (mostly rural), access to grid electricity is even lower at about 31% nationwide. Regionally, only the southwest has access of over 50% (except Kano). While there has been a growth of 1.1 percent yearly since 2010 on electricity access in the country, It has not kept pace with population growth of 3% yearly," He announced in the meeting.

According to him, one of the reasons for this was the lack of payment disciple from Nigerians, which is, in turn, a result of the loss that lack of electricity costs Nigerians. He stressed that lack of power causes Nigerian businesses about $29 billion annually, as people in the country pay for only about half of the electricity they get.

Nigerians are said to owe about N273.4 billion electricity debt last year alone.

The Nigerian Government has however debunked the report, calling it false, and claiming it was "worrisome" that the World Bank would reach such a conclusion without evidence.

Mr. Ahmad Rufai Zakaria, the special adviser to the president on Infrastructure, in a bid to correct the "misinformation", said, “It is inaccurate to make a blanket statement that 78% of Nigerians have less than 12 hours daily access. Empirical evidence from the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) shows that only 55% of citizens connected to the grid are in tariff bands D and E which are less than 12 hours supply."

The spokesman has asked that the report be dismissed, stating that it was unclear who carried out the survey and when it was carried out.