Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Geometric Power Group, Prof Barth Nnaji, has said that, so far, the Aba Integrated Power Project has gulped over $800 million.

He added that it was now the single largest investment in the South East. He disclosed this in a speech titled: ‘The Nigerian Possibility,’ during the visit of a former President of Nigeria, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, to Geometric Power’s Aba Integrated Power in Aba, Abia state.

He also lauded the contributions of the Governor of Abia State, Alex Otti, former President Muhammadu Buhari and his officials as well as President Bola Tinubu and his administration’s team for their invaluable contributions to the growth of the power institution.

Nnaji, who is a former Minister of Power, said the Aba Independent Power Project, would not have been born without Obasanjo’s strong and visionary support.

He noted that Obasanjo was Nigeria’s military Head of State from 1976 to 1979 and the democratically elected President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria from 1999 to 2007.

He said: “The story began in 2000 when the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA) was constructing the Transmission Line from Shiroro to Katampe in Abuja to meet the fast-growing demand for power in the new Federal Capital City.

The then NEPA needed a capable firm to build an Emergency Power Plant in Abuja to meet the demand pending the completion of the transmission line for power supply from the grid.

“Against all manner of unpatriotic forces, President Obasanjo approved a contract for our small team of talented Nigerian engineers led by me to build and operate the 22MW Abuja Emergency Power Plant designed to supply 15MW on 24/7 reliable basis to the entire Abuja Central Business District.

Our company, built and operated one the two plants, while Aggreko of Scotland built and operated the second one of the same size.

“We are proud that instead of operating it for only one year that the plant operated successfully and supplied power reliably for over two years and four months it took to complete the Shiroro – Katampe 330KV line.

During this period, power supply to these places in the Central Area of Abuja did not blink.” He explained that bolstered by this experience, when the then World Bank President, Jim Wolfonsohn, visited Aba with the newly appointed Nigerian Minister of Finance, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, on March 16, 2004, and discovered that the greatest obstacle to the industrial take-off of the famous Enyimba City was the absence of constant and reliable electricity, they urged him to consider building a power plant in Aba for the numerous small, medium and large industrialists in the area.

The rest is history. He added that the Aba Integrated Power Project includes Geometric Power Aba Ltd (GPAL), an embedded generation licensee for 188MW Power Plant with its dedicated 27Km gas pipeline from the gas processing station in Owaza to the power plant in Osisioma; and the electricity distribution licensee, Aba Power Electric, popularly known as Aba Power, which has eleven (11) substations including four brand new 2x15MVA substations each, which Obasanjo commissioned on the day of his visit.