THE ECONOMY OF DARKNESS: From One Family’s Pain to a Nation’s Loss
By Citizen Bolaji O. Akinyemi
Last week, darkness did not just visit—it stayed.
It began like every other outage Nigerians have grown used to. Light went off. No notice. No explanation. No timeline. Just silence.
In Nigeria, outages no longer shock us. We have trained our minds to expect their return. An hour, maybe two. At worst, overnight.
But this time, it didn’t come back.
A Family Prepared… for the Wrong Battle
That same day, my wife had done what millions of Nigerian women do at the start of a new month.
She went to the market.
Bought foodstuff in bulk.
Cooked soups. Prepared stews.
Stored them carefully in the freezer.
It was not just routine—it was strategy.
A system designed to manage rising food costs and uncertain income.
By evening, the reality began to unfold.
The freezer was no longer storage.
It had become a race against time.
When Survival Becomes Expense
The response was immediate: fuel the generator.
10 litres.
Not for comfort.
Not for convenience.
But to prevent food from spoiling.
That decision marked the beginning of a new rhythm:
Generator on
Generator off
Generator on again
Each hour powered by fuel.
Each hour funded by sacrifice.
₦13,300 per day.
Burnt—not invested.
Spent—not planned.
Lost—for no fault of ours.
For days.
This is the quiet suffering of families across Nigeria.
The Household Economy Under Siege
What happened in my home is not unique. It is replicated in millions of homes:
A mother waking in the night to switch power sources
A father recalculating budgets between fuel and school fees
Children studying to the noise of generators
The constant fear that food may not survive till morning
This is not resilience.
This is what happens when citizens are forced to replace the state.
From the Kitchen to the Country
Now, step back from this one household.
Zoom out.
What you see is not just a domestic inconvenience—it is a national crisis.
Nigeria began generating electricity in 1896. That is over 130 years ago.
Yet today, in March 2026, the entire national grid struggles to deliver about 4,000 to 5,000 megawatts—for over 220 million people.
Compare that with:
South Africa: about 48,000MW for 60 million people
Egypt: about 59,000MW for 110 million people
Nigeria has roughly 13,000MW installed capacity.
But more than half of it cannot be transmitted.
Not because it cannot be generated—
but because the system cannot carry it.
This is not a power shortage.
It is a governance failure.
Collapse as a System
Between 2010 and 2022, Nigeria recorded at least 222 grid collapses.
That is one collapse every three weeks for twelve years.
In 2024 alone:
12 grid collapses
128 transmission towers vandalized
₦8.8 billion spent on repairs
Each collapse is not just technical—it is economic destruction.
Restarting only three power plants—Azura, Delta, and Shiroro—costs about $25 million per incident.
Nigeria is not just losing power.
Nigeria is paying heavily for failure.
Debt, Gas, and Manufactured Darkness
As of early 2026:
Power sector debt stands at ₦6.8 trillion
Increasing by ₦200 billion monthly
About ₦3.3 trillion owed to gas suppliers
Gas suppliers responded the only way they could—by cutting supply.
Required daily gas: 1,630 million standard cubic feet
Actual supply: 692 million
Less than 43%.
This is why homes go dark.
This is why businesses shut down.
Darkness in Nigeria is no longer accidental.
It is structured.
The Generator Nation
So Nigerians have done what they always do—adapt.
Over 22 million generators in use
Combined capacity: about 42,000MW
Annual spending: $14 billion
Think about that:
Citizens generate eight times more power than the national grid supplies.
Nigeria is not underpowered.
Nigeria is privately powered and publicly failed.
The Cost to Industry and Livelihoods
In 2023 alone:
767 manufacturing companies shut down
335 became distressed
18,000 jobs were lost
In the first half of 2025:
The Presidential Villa became a model of alternative power.
And so across homes and industries ₦676.6 billion spent on alternative power
18,935 more jobs lost
The impact is brutal and consistent.
According to the World Bank, power outages cost Nigeria about $29 billion annually—roughly 10% of GDP.
No serious economy survives like this.
The Illusion of Effort
Since 1999, every administration has announced power sector reforms.
Billions of dollars have been spent.
Loans have been taken.
Policies have been drafted.
Yet the grid still struggles at 5,000MW.
This tells us the truth:
The problem is not lack of plans.
It is lack of execution.
What Others Did Differently
Egypt added 14,000MW in six years
Ghana stabilized its grid and now exports electricity
South Africa, after years of crisis, achieved over 300 days without load shedding
The difference is not knowledge.
It is leadership.
The True Meaning of Darkness
Darkness in Nigeria is not just the absence of electricity.
It is:
Lost income
Lost businesses
Lost jobs
Lost opportunities
It is the mother protecting food with fuel.
It is the father choosing between power and school fees.
It is the child studying under noise and fumes.
It is a nation paying daily for what should already exist.
The Promise of Light
If Nigeria fixes power:
Industries will return
Jobs will be created
Costs will drop
Investments will rise
GDP will expand
Electricity is not just infrastructure.
It is economic oxygen.
Closing: From One Week to a Way of Life
What happened in my home last week is a small window into a larger truth.
For millions of Nigerians, that experience is not an exception.
It is routine.
Until power becomes reliable, every Nigerian household will continue to run a private economy—
fueling generators, managing uncertainty, and absorbing costs that should never exist.
Nigeria is not just living in darkness.
Nigeria is funding it.
And until that changes,
the economy of darkness will continue to define both our homes and our future.
