Nigeria reaffirmed its commitment to deepening strategic alliances with Japan and other international partners during the just concluded 9th Tokyo International Conference on African Development in Yokohama, Japan.
The Nigerian delegation, led by President Bola Tinubu, participated in high-level engagements that prioritised power, infrastructure, and industrial transformation as critical levers for sustainable development.
According to a statement by Nigeria’s Ministry of Power, Nigeria secured $190m loan at the event, for renewable energy projects.
The statement stated that President Tinubu emphasised during his speech at the summit that Nigeria’s participation at TICAD 9 was not about trade exhibitions, but about forging strategic, outcome-driven partnerships that would deliver tangible results for the Nigerian people.
He stressed that Nigeria was deliberately shifting from planning to implementation, from agreements to delivery, and from promises to measurable results.
It added that Nigeria’s Minister of Power, Mr. Adebayo Adelabu, who was part of the Nigerian delegation, held high-level engagements with Japanese stakeholders, including Toshiba, Hitachi, Japan’s Transmission and Distribution Corporation, and Energy Exchange corporations.
It noted that these engagements focused on transmission infrastructure, operational efficiency, and strategies to reduce system losses.
The statement said that the minister announced that Nigeria was extended a $190m renewable energy loan facility supported by the Japan International Cooperation Agency, designed to scale distributed renewable energy solutions across underserved communities.
“This builds on the recently launched $750m World Bank Distributed Access through Renewable Energy Scale-up programme under the Mission 300 Compact, which aims to bring clean and reliable electricity to more than 17 million Nigerians,” the statement said.
“These engagements built on the recent Federal Executive Council approvals for counterpart funding of ₦19,083,192,805.30 to catalyse a loan funding of $238m from JICA. This loan funding will support the expansion of the national grid with the addition of 102.95km of new 330kV double circuit (DC) line, 104.59km of new 132kV double circuit (DC) line, four 330/132/33kV substations, two132/33kv substations, two 330kV line bays extension, two 132kV line bays extension, and one 132kV Substation.”
Adelabu also highlighted the commissioning of three substations funded by JICA through a $32m grant in Apo (FCT), Keffi (Nasarawa State), and Apapa (Lagos State). These projects will directly strengthen supply reliability to households, businesses, and industrial clusters, including critical facilities such as the Lagos Port and surrounding industrial areas.
Through the partnership with JICA, the National Power Training Institute of Nigeria (NAPTIN) has commissioned state-of-the-art training equipment in Abuja to strengthen the skills of distribution engineers and tackle network losses. This facility is designed to deepen local expertise and promote long-term sustainability in sector operations through capacity development.
GIK/APA