By Jane Ighodalo
For over seven months, entire stretches of Egan, Igando, and Ijegun communities in Lagos have lived in darkness — victims of what residents describe as a pattern of neglect by the Ikeja Electricity Distribution Company (IKEDC).
Their crime? Owning transformers that broke down and were taken away “for repairs.” Their punishment? Endless waiting, economic hardship, and a creeping sense that power in Nigeria is not just a utility problem — it’s a moral one.
“In April, our transformer developed a fault and IKEDC came to take it for repairs,” said Silas Elehibiri, a mechanical engineer who lives in Egan. “They said it would be quick. It’s now seven months, and we’ve been in total darkness.”
Elehibiri said at least ten streets — including Taiwo, Emmanuel Akanji, Busari, Abimbola, Modina, and Olokode — have been without power since April. “Businesses have shut down. People can’t refrigerate food or run their homes. We are living in the Stone Age,” he said.
What began as a simple technical repair soon became a nightmare. According to residents, some IKEDC officials later demanded a ₦20,000 per household “contribution” to “fast-track” the transformer’s return. Elehibiri explained. “When we refused, everything stopped.”
To protect what was left of their infrastructure, residents hired night guards to watch over the transformer cables. But as the months dragged on and contributions dried up, vandals struck, stealing parts of the equipment.
IKEDC officials later told them they were “number 35 on the list” of pending transformer repairs. “We don’t even know what that means anymore,” Elehibiri said bitterly. “How many more months does it take to fix a transformer?”
The story in Ijegun, a few kilometres away, is no different. There, the community’s transformer — located near Blevic Petrol Station and powering the area’s bustling business corridor — was taken away in March or April for repair. It has not been seen since.
“We’ve gone to IKEDC’s Ijegun office countless times,” said Dr. Ifeanyi Nwosu, medical practitioner in the area. “They keep saying we’re number three on their list. Meanwhile, we spend over ₦60,000 monthly on fuel. It’s suffocating.”
Some residents believe the company is waiting for them to pay unofficial levies. “The same thing happened before in our area,” Nwosu said. “People had to contribute money — even for the crane to lift and reinstall the transformer. It seems unless you pay, nothing moves.”
The blackout has crippled local businesses. Hairdressers, welders, frozen food sellers, and tailors have all reported huge losses. “IKEDC is killing small businesses,” said Mrs. Toyin Adebayo, a hairdresser in Ijegun. “We buy fuel every day.
Residents say appeals to IKEDC have yielded no result. FIJ (source of the Egan, Igando story) email inquiry to the company reportedly went unanswered.
Beyond these communities, the pattern reflects a deeper rot in Nigeria’s power distribution system — where technical faults easily become long-term abandonment and where citizens are routinely asked to “contribute” to access services already paid for through tariffs. And they are operating as a fully privatized public sector business.
“This is not just poor service delivery,” said Engr. Tunde Adesina, an energy policy expert. “It’s a form of extortion disguised as bureaucracy. Transformers are public infrastructure — customers should not be funding repairs or bribing to get them back.”
He called on the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) and the Lagos State Electricity Regulatory Commission (LASERC) — which recently assumed control over IKEDC, now IE Energy Lagos, the new owners — to investigate what he described as “an unwholesome and exploitative pattern.”
“The regulators must step in,” Adesina said. “Communities cannot be left in darkness for months while officials trade excuses.”
As Lagos races to grow It’s industrialize, these communities are trapped in a paradox: a megacity without megawatts, where families sleep in darkness and traders count losses by the day.
If power is the lifeblood of a modern economy, then the silence of Egan and Ijegun is not just a technical failure — it is a slow asphyxiation.
It’s time for the authorities to act decisively. IKEDC must answer for its service lapses, and regulators must stop treating negligence as a footnote. No community should have to beg or bribe for electricity in a country that bills itself as Africa’s largest economy.
Until that happens, the lights will remain off — and with them, the promise of progress for millions of ordinary Nigerians.