KEY POINTS
- Bodija residents are calling for immediate government intervention after years of worsening electricity supply.
- The community says it never received the promised Band A or Band B service levels despite tariff increases.
- Residents want the Federal Government to install a new transformer by December 2025 to restore stable power.
Residents of Bodija in Ibadan are pressing the Minister of Power for urgent intervention as the community’s electricity supply continues to deteriorate, leaving homes and businesses in prolonged darkness.
The Bodija Estate Residents Association, which brings together all neighbourhood groups across the estate, said the situation has now stretched beyond what the community can manage on its own.
Bodija, developed in 1959 by the then Western Nigeria Housing Corporation under the leadership of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, was once held up as the country’s most orderly and thoughtfully planned residential estate.
Today, the community’s reputation for steady, comfortable living is increasingly undermined by a power supply crisis that residents say has dragged on for more than five years.
In a statement issued in Ibadan, the association’s president, Pastor Muyiwa Bamgbose, said outages across Old Bodija, New Bodija, Basorun, Iwo Road, Oje, Mokola and adjoining districts now last for days at a time, and in some cases for weeks, without any reliable word from the Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company.
Bodija Says Tariff Hikes Brought No Improvement as Power Delivery Falls Short of Promises
The association noted that although the estate had long been placed in Band A, which should guarantee at least 20 hours of electricity each day, residents never received anything close to that benchmark, even while paying higher tariffs.
Matters worsened after the federal government’s tariff review in April 2024, when the Band A rate climbed to 225 naira per kilowatt hour. Not long after, Bodija was moved to Band B, with an advertised minimum of 16 hours daily supply, but residents say this has remained largely theoretical.
At the centre of the problem is a 40-MVA transformer operated by the Transmission Company of Nigeria. According to BERA, the transformer is now badly overloaded and struggling to meet the rising electricity needs of Bodija and neighbouring districts.
The result is an unstable supply that regularly throws households, shops and offices into sudden blackouts.
