[size=14pt]Facebook brings U.S-based Nigerian’s ideas to Jonathan [/size]
By Atom Lim
August 22, 2010 12:34AM

In 1985, the then Nigerian ambassador to the United States received a letter from a Nigerian who had just earned an MBA in Marketing at the California State University. In the letter, Toyin Dawodu asked the diplomat to convey his proposal for the creation of Nigeria’s sovereign wealth fund to the then Head of State, Muhammadu Buhari.

Embassy officials acknowledged receipt of the letter, but that was the last Mr. Dawodu heard from them. Twenty five years after the incident and after several failed attempts to get a Nigerian leader to consider any of his proposals, Mr Dawodu received news from friends that Goodluck Jonathan had instructed presidency staff to contact him over his idea to generate 4,000 megawatts of power in Nigeria.

On July 5, seven days after joining the social network site Facebook, Mr Jonathan wrote on his page: “Again, I spent time reading your comments and yesterday a youth named Toyin Dawodu indicated that he had an idea for a project that could deliver 4,000 MWs of electricity. I believe in the creativity and the spirit of innovation resident in our youth and I want to give Toyin Dawodu a chance to be heard. Toyin, someone from my office will make contact with you regarding your idea.”

The President’s announcement was a breakthrough for Mr Dawodu, who had written to Nigeria’s U.S ambassador in April to seek consideration of his proposal. The letter did not get him contact with the President as he desired; but it earned him a meeting with Ade Adefuye, the ambassador, and an invitation to a meeting of the U.S-Nigeria Binational Commission on Energy and Investment in Washington.

About three weeks after the announcement on Facebook, Mr Dawodu says he had a visit from Oronto Douglas, the President’s Senior Special Assistant on Strategy, in California, where he lives. At this first meeting, the President’s aide received Mr Dawodu’s proposal with a promise officials directly involved in the power sector would study it. When contacted, Mr Douglas confirmed the meeting but failed to disclose the status of the proposal.

Plan to produce 4000MWs

Mr Dawodu is a Managing Partner at Capital Investment Group, a company he says is “a diversified Investment Company, dedicated to developing infrastructure worldwide”. To provide the 4000MWs he promised on the President’s Facebook page, Mr Dawodu says his company’s strategy involves generating power in individual communities rather than from a central source. According to him, the strategy would deal with the major challenge of power generation in Nigeria which he says is the use of large turbines that take too much resource to operate. He would not disclose the details of the plan but says generation will depend on liquefied natural gas, liquefied petroleum gas, and landfill methane gas.

In response to a question on whether power supply can improve in Nigeria, Mr Dawodu said:

“The Nigerian power problem can be solved if the government can let every state and community generate their own power”, adding that “The government needs to deregulate the power sector fast”.

To show his commitment to the project, Mr Dawodu says his company plans to build a plant to “produce 10MWs of power somewhere in Nigeria in the next six months”. Such a project should cost billions of naira. According to a report presented to the U.S congress by the Federation of American Scientists in 2008,“Even relatively small power plants cost millions of dollars. For example, the capital cost for a 50 MW wind plant would be about $105 million at $2,100 per KW of capacity”.

Last week, Zambia signed a deal with two Chinese companies to construct a hydropower plant that will produce 600MWs of power at the cost of $1.5 billion. Despite the financial implication of producing 10MWs, Mr Dawodu says the plan will go ahead. He says his company has secured commitment from companies willing to finance the project.

Faith in government

Although it is almost a month since the President’s aide collected his proposal and has not contacted him, Mr Dawodu is not giving up on the government. He is optimistic the Presidency will act on his proposal because “I see the fact that people are tired of the same thing (poor power supply). I see pressure on the government increasing”. He is contributing to the pressure on the government by involving Nigerians in campaigns on social network sites and blogs for better power. One such group, Nigeria Needs Fans, has 3, 314 fans who regularly comment on the country’s power situation.

As a subtle reminder to the president, Mr Dawodu has continued to post on the President’s Facebook page. On August 9, his message to the President was, “I read in one of the Nigerian news papers today that our economy will soon rebound as power generation reaches 3,804 megawatts. I would like you to know that we stand ready to begin delivery of another 4,000 megawatts of power to Nigeria within the next six months as stated in our last posting.

“We have the plans, it is revolutionary, and we know it would work. All we need is your commitment. We are even prepared to arrange our own financing. Our plan does not take away from what is on ground or any other existing plan. We need to give small innovative Nigerian companies a chance to help the country. Please contact us”. On Thursday, August 19, he had another post on the president’s page.

As if in response to the cry by Mr Dawodu and other Nigerians, Mr Jonathan, also on August 19, wrote on his Facebook page, “I will be spending time daily scrutinising your comments and I will be taking them into account with a view to incorporating them in the new Road-map For the Power Sector which is to be launched on August 26th”.

http://234next.com/csp/cms/sites/Next/Home/5609384-146/facebook_brings_u.s-based_nigerians_ideas_to.csp

ok

All these long stories 4 how many years?all we want is light and not grammar

philip0906:

All these long stories 4 how many years?all we want is light and not grammar

Story, story! STORY!!!