Sixteen State Electricity Regulatory Commissions have submitted a formal objection to the Electricity Act Amendment Bill 2026, warning that the proposed legislation sought to reverse the constitutional devolution of power sector authority to states, threatened more than one billion dollars in investments already committed under the 2023 Electricity Act, and risked returning the country to the same centralized regulatory model that had failed to increase per capita electricity consumption over two decades.
In a memorandum jointly signed by the SERC chairmen and chief executives of Abia, Anambra, Bayelsa, Edo, Ekiti, Enugu, Gombe, Imo, Kogi, Lagos, Nasarawa, Niger, Plateau, Ondo, Ogun, and Oyo states and addressed to the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Power, the regulators said a review of the bill showed a clear intention to reconsolidate federal control over electricity matters that were constitutionally within states’ jurisdiction under the Fifth Alteration of the Constitution and the Electricity Act 2023.
The regulators challenged Section 2 of the bill, which they said was based on a misunderstanding of Nigerian constitutional law by attempting to make the National Assembly the source of states’ power to legislate on electricity matters, and requiring National Assembly approval for State Houses of Assembly to make electricity laws. They said legislative powers were derived directly from the constitution and could only be modified by constitutional amendment, not by an ordinary Act of the National Assembly.
They also objected to provisions that would eliminate the protection of state laws from invalidation, extend federal control to the National Wholesale Electricity Market even for power sold within a single state, strip state regulators of authority to license mini-grids and independent network operators, expand the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission’s control over consumer tariffs and the Power Consumers Assistance Fund, and create a Forum of Electricity Regulators with NERC as an appellate authority over state electricity regulators.
The regulators said what Nigeria needed was not top-down federal legislation but proper coordination protocols between NERC and state regulators, particularly on transmission and grid reliability. They urged the Senate to reject provisions that usurped state powers, warning that reconsolidating federal control at a time when states such as Lagos, Edo, and Taraba had already enacted electricity laws and licensed operators would create legal uncertainty and deter the private capital Nigeria most urgently needed.
