A 33 kV Network for Okene: ₦15.3 Billion of Distribution Infrastructure in Kogi State — ICC Offshore
This was the most recent of the four REA programmes delivered by the company, and the only one certified under the signature of the Agency’s Managing Director.
Why Okene
Okene sits in the Ebira-speaking central belt of Kogi State, on the corridor linking Abuja to Nigeria’s South West. It is a substantial urban settlement surrounded by a dense ring of smaller communities, and it sits within one of the parts of the federation where distribution infrastructure has historically lagged behind population.
Kogi’s position at the confluence of the Niger and Benue also makes it a transit state: distribution works here support not only local supply but the reliability of the corridor economy running through it.
Scope Delivered
The project comprised the full design and construction of a distribution network, executed as a single integrated scope:
| Component | Quantity |
|---|---|
| Medium voltage (33 kV) ACSR lines | 337.2 km |
| MV poles, with accessories | 3,705 |
| IACM | 121 |
| MV substations (6,500 kVA combined capacity) | 70 |
| Low voltage (0.415 kV) AAC lines | 276 km |
| LV poles, with accessories | 6,418 |
| Overhead twisted aluminium cable (2×16 mm²) | 601,376.4 lm |
| Overhead twisted aluminium cable (4×16 mm²) | 131,911.2 lm |
| Single-phase meters | 19,980 |
| Three-phase meters | 3,672 |
Execution Record
| Milestone | Date |
|---|---|
| Proposal submitted | 30 June 2022 |
| Notification of award | 2 November 2022 |
| Works commenced | 7 December 2022 |
| Works completed | 28 May 2024 |
| Certificate of Completion issued | 12 July 2024 |
Total duration from commencement to completion: approximately 18 months. The Agency’s certificate records that project activities were completed within the scheduled timeframe, adhering to industry standards and project specifications, and that the system has been fully operational with no significant technical issues reported.
What This Demonstrates
A continuing client relationship. This was the fourth award from the same agency across a four-year period, following contracts in Anambra, Cross River and Borno. Repeat awards from a single public client, each following a competitive proposal, are the clearest available evidence of delivery performance on the preceding work.
Recency. Completed in May 2024 and certified in July 2024, this is the company’s most current Nigerian distribution reference and the one most relevant to present-day prequalification.
Consistent delivery cadence. Eighteen months from site commencement to full completion, on a scope comparable in composition to the earlier programmes.
State Delivery and Its Social Return
The scale of the problem these contracts sit within. World Bank tracking published in 2025 recorded 86.8 million Nigerians without access to electricity — the largest deficit of any country — against a national access rate of 61 per cent. Access alone understates the difficulty: national household survey data indicates Nigerian households experience roughly seven outages per week, with a typical duration of about twelve hours. Coping means generators, which are financially burdensome and a source of emissions harmful to health.
What completion signifies. Nigerian public infrastructure is frequently criticised for projects that are awarded, partly executed and abandoned. A programme that is competitively tendered, executed to schedule, commissioned, certified by the contracting agency and thereafter operated is, in that context, a governance outcome in its own right — separate from the electricity it carries. Across the four contracts in this programme, that cycle was completed four times between 2020 and 2024.
Where the social return actually accrues. The documented benefits of reliable distribution supply follow consistent paths: cold chain and equipment reliability in clinics; lighting that extends study hours; powered boreholes and pumped water; street lighting and its relationship to public safety; and refrigeration, milling and small-scale processing that convert a household into a business. The World Bank has separately noted that women-headed households in Africa are less likely to have access than others and that improved access supports women’s incomes — meaning the distributional effect of a connection programme is not neutral across a community.
A caution on how to state this. The mechanisms above are established in the development literature; they are not measured outcomes for these four specific projects. No impact evaluation of these networks is referenced in the completion certificates, and none should be implied. If the company wishes to make outcome claims — households connected, businesses established, hours of supply delivered — those require post-commissioning survey data. Absent that data, the defensible claim is that the infrastructure enabling those outcomes was delivered and certified.
Continuing demand. The Mission 300 initiative led by the World Bank and the African Development Bank targets electricity access for 300 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa over five years. Nigeria, holding the largest single national deficit, is central to that programme. The pipeline for distribution contractors with demonstrated delivery records in the country is therefore not a function of any single administration’s priorities.
Part of a Four-Project Programme
This project is one of four distribution contracts executed by International Consolidated Contractors Offshore SAL for the Rural Electrification Agency between 2020 and 2024:
| State | Contract Reference | Value (₦) | Executed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Anambra | REA/C/GO/RFP/138/20 | 14,982,189,523.00 | Jan 2021 – Jul 2023 |
| Cross River (Calabar) | REA/C/GO/RFP/026/21 | 30,222,025,633.60 | May 2021 – May 2023 |
| Borno (Maiduguri) | REA/C/GO/RFP/094/21 | 12,473,941,662.50 | Jun 2021 – Jun 2022 |
| Kogi (Okene) | REA/C/GO/RFP/147/22 | 15,284,911,599.78 | Dec 2022 – May 2024 |
| Total | 72,963,068,418.88 |
Across the four contracts: 2,578 km of distribution line, 325 substations totalling 33.3 MVA, 42,089 poles and 93,732 metered connections.
Notes on Figures
All contract values are stated in Nigerian naira as contracted. US dollar equivalents reflect the rate prevailing at the date of each award; the naira has depreciated substantially across the period covered, so values from different years are not directly comparable and should not be summed in dollars without restating to a common date.
Supporting documentation — the Notification of Award dated 2 November 2022 and the Certificate of Completion dated 12 July 2024, both issued by the Rural Electrification Agency under contract reference REA/C/GO/RFP/147/22 — is available on request.
Business Development · Power & Infrastructure Division
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