The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN), says it is doing everything possible to restore the vandalized No.104 Transmission Tower along 330KV Odukpani-Ikot Ekpene transmission line, even as the power supply continues to degenerate.
The line which is connected to the national grid was vandalised recently causing power outages for those drawing power from the line.
The Minister of Power, Abubakar Aliyu had decried endless vandalism to the national grid including a shortage of gas supplies to stabilise power.
He had, while briefing State House Correspondents recently, exonerated the federal government from most of the challenges bedevilling the sector.
But explaining further, the Executive Director of Transmission Service Provider, TCN, Victor Adewumi who was in Oku Iboku in Itu local government area on Wednesday to assess the progress of work, said a weeklong timeline has been set to complete the reconstruction work.
He appealed to affected areas especially Cross River and Akwa Ibom States to exercise patience as the work was in its advanced stage of completion.
He attributed the delay to certain unforeseen conditions around the transmission line but noted that efforts were being redoubled to ensure prompt restoration of power to the affected areas.
His words, “There were some challenges. For instance, we didn’t envisage that the integrity of the foundation was compromised so we had to start from scratch. It takes time to work on the foundation.
“And we thought cranes would the job, to lift up the conductor, unfortunately, the boom couldn’t reach the top of the grid. So we went to the normal way of lowering the wire to the tension tower. So we are here to see the progress of work.
“We’re appealing to the people of Cross River and Akwa Ibom states to exercise patience, we’re doing everything within our power to make sure that the Tower is completed soon. The contractor is complaining that they’re putting pressure on him.
“Of course, there is a blackout in the whole of Calabar. Everybody is waiting for the grid to come back to normal. But we want to tell the whole world that we are not sleeping”. He said
Adewumi further revealed that the weight of the Tower, which is on top of the hill, also called for extra care, to avoid creating more problems.
He once again appealed to host communities to always take ownership of physical infrastructure sited within their domain, by protecting them from vandals.
Also speaking, the Port-Harcourt Regional Transmission Manager, Daniel Udofia explained that there were so many challenges that delayed the completion of the vandalized tower.
In his words “There were so many challenges that we faced when we started the work. If you look beyond here, you will see a Swamp and beyond the swamp, there is River.
“While we were trying to shift the Conductors, we took all these things into consideration so that the Conductor does not slip back to the swamp or the river. If this Tower was not vandalized, we would not have been here. So anywhere we have this kind of Infrastructure, let us protect it”.
