President Bola Tinubu has signed the Electricity Bill into law, signaling the de-monopolisation of Nigeria’s electricity generation, transmission, and distribution of electricity at the National level.

The new law also empowers states, companies and individuals to generate, transmit and distribute electricity.

Reports indicated that the president signed the new bill into law after the final harmonized version by the Senate and House of Representatives were sent to him.

With the ninth National Assembly expiring, the president has till June 10 (tomorrow) to sign the bill into law else it would have to go through another round of legislative process. This was after former President Muhammadu Buhari failed to sign it before leaving office May 29.

It was gathered that due to the importance of the bill, President Tinubu was urged to sign it before its expiration of the ninth National Assembly to guard against it suffering the fate the Petroleum Industry Bill (now Petroleum Industry Act) suffered, taking it 20 years to become a law.

A former Governor from the North who just left office and who is very influential in the All Progressives Congress (APC), it was gathered, reached out to President Tinubu early in the week to alert him on the importance of signing the Bill before the end of ninth NASS.

The new bill states that anyone may construct, own or operate an undertaking for generating electricity not exceeding 1 megawatt (MW) in aggregate at a site or an undertaking for distribution of electricity with a capacity not exceeding 100 kilowatts (KW) in aggregate at a site, or such other capacity as Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) may determine from time to time, without a license.