THE Federal Executive Council, yesterday, approved a total sum of $2,541,689 and N498,230,281 for four projects in the Ministry of Power.
The Minister of Power, Saleh Mamman, stated this while briefing State House correspondents at the end of the virtual Federal Executive Council, FEC, presided over by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo at the First Lady’s Conference Room, Presidential Villa, Abuja.
The minister, flanked by his counterparts from the Ministries of Works and Housing, Environment and Information an Culture; Babatunde Fashola, Muhammed Mahmood and Lai Mohammed, respectively, provided details of the contracts.
He said: “The Federal Ministry of Power also received the blessing of the Federal Executive Council by giving four approvals for our contracts. One is the supply and installation of motorised portable hydraulic compressor for the Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN, in favour of Messrs Intern Equipment Nigeria Limited in the sum of US$502,950 plus N15,800,000.
“The second approval was also received for the award of the contract for the supply and delivery of three sets of online partial discharge measurement and monitoring equipment for the TCN in favour of Messrs T and D Technology Limited in the sum of US$ 874,800 offshore plus N240,100,000 onshore with a delivery period of nine months.
“The third approval was the award of the contract for the repairs of 100 MVA and four sets of 60 MVA 132 33 power transformers for TCN in favour of GT Engineering Limited in the sum of US$ 661,220 offshore and N127,758,781 onshore with a delivery period of 12 months.
“On the last one, approval was also granted for the contract for procurement of 10 sets of 330 KV and 30 sets of 133 KV circuit breaker for the TCN in favour of Horsepower Engineering Trading Limited in the sum of US$ 502,719 plus N114,571,500 with a delivery period of six months.”
Also briefing, the Minister of Environment said the Council ratified an anticipatory approval received from President Muhammadu Buhari on the nation’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC), which is part of its commitment to the climate change pact.
He explained that the contribution, which saw Nigeria agreeing to cut greenhouse gas emission by 20 percent as at last year and by 45 percent in 2030, adding that part of the obligations to the signatories of the agreement is the revision of the progress and the submission of an interim report every five years.
He said: “The Federal Ministry of Environment presented a memo today, seeking for the ratification of an anticipatory approval that we received from Mr. President, on the submission of our primary NDC, that is the Nationally Determined Contribution.
“This is part of the commitment that Nigeria made in 2016 during the Paris Agreement; that every country, after five years, will revise the commitment the country made in cutting down emission.
‘’So, at the time we committed to reducing emission by 20 percent, unconditionally, meaning we can do it by ourselves. That’s by 2020. The 20 percent is by the year 2020. At the same time, we are also committed to reducing 45% by 2030. That’s again from the year 2016.
“So, we did the first the interim report, a country is supposed to send in an interim report to the United Nations Climate Change desk, and then before July 31, you’ll now submit the final report.
‘’We have done that and part of this reporting is again, for every country, doing that will put the country on a good footing as far as climate change action is concerned and this has a number of sectors that we depended on to be able to reach this: Power, Agriculture, Transportation.
“These are areas that we used as part of attending to that commitment that we made and today, we have gotten the approval of the ratification following that statutory approval by Mr. President. So, Nigeria is currently in good standing, as about 100 countries have already submitted and Nigeria is one of those,” he explained.
Asked if Nigeria achieved the 20 percent emission cut as at last year, Mahmood said “yes, we have. Since the ratification of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change in 2016 and even before then, government has put in a number of interventions to deal with the issue of climate change. You see, climate change did not just start in 2016. 2016 happened to be just like the culmination of the problem that showed and there’s need for an immediate action on climate change.
“So, the government rolled out a number of things and this was even before I became a minister and we have done so much, I can give you an example.
That was when we started the issuance of green bond and bond issuance is to generate money, solely for green projects.
“Based on our calculations, we have met that 20 percent last year, in fact, I can even say we have surpassed that. That’s why we took that as unconditional, it’s something that we know already we can.”