The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) said 86 towers were vandalised in 2024, with 26 completely brought down.
Mr. Ali Sharifa, general manager, Transmission Service at TCN, disclosed this during a presentation on infrastructure vandalism at a workshop organised for Power Correspondents in Keffi.
He said 2024 and 2025 have been the most trying times for TCN as a responsive public utility due to vandalism of its transmission line infrastructure by the non-state actors.
”A total of 86 towers were vandalised in 2024 with 26 towers completely down, which put affected states to total darkness.
“These vandalism spans across Abuja, Bauchi, Enugu, Shiroro, Kano and Port-Harcourt Regions.
”While in the first and second quarters of 2025 a total of 42 acts of vandalism were recorded affecting a total of 178 towers,”he said.
He said besides the activities of vandals, natural disasters also hindered the free flow of electricity to the grid as TCN recently recorded along Kainji-Birnin Kebbi 330kV SC (International)line.
” Where six towers T306, 1307, T308, T365, T366 and 1367 collapsed in May due to windstorms and torrential rainfall.
”In the same May, Apir-Lafia-Jos 330kV DC Line Tower T137 had a twist (partial collapse) due to windstorm and torrential rainfall, ”he said.
Sharifa said that sabotage, political and economic reasons were responsible for these acts of vandalism.
He listed the the effect of TCN’s infrastructure vandalism to include
disruption of power supply across the Nigeria Electricity Supply Industry , as the generated power from the generation station could not be wheeled to the distribution ends.
“Other effects of vandalism include the incurement of significant costs by the company due to repairs, replacement and need for increased security measures to address vandalism.
”The company’s grid expansion efforts are hindered by acts of vandalism to pay contractor’s invoices used on repairs.
”And there is also the concern with public safety whenever transmission infrastructure is vandalised,”he said.
He, however, said the company was reaching out to locals where the transmission lines were prone to vandalism, adding that they were also
engaging with the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) after the series of vandalism in 2024,
“TCN reached out to ONSA for the protection of vulnerable transmission lines against vandalism.
“Some critical lines have been selected as pilot schemes for which state- of- art technology will be deployed to monitor and deter future vandalism.
“Sensitisation and sponsored programmes, jingles on both social and print media including radio and television stations against vandalism of TCN assets is reaching far and wide as Nigerians are now fully informed that TCN property is their property,” he said.
Sharifa said sensitisation had led to the arrest of vandals who were now facing prosecution.