How I Got License For $2bn Nigeria’s Biggest Power Plant — Davido’s Father

Posted by Nwa Diokpa Featured, Latest Headlines, News Across Nigeria Wednesday, October 16th, 2024

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – Adedeji Adeleke, the father of the award-winning singer, David, better known as Davido, has opened up on how he got the license to get the environmental permit for his power plant worth over $2 billion.

The billionaire industrialist stated this while speaking as a Layperson from the West-Central Africa Division during the Seventh Day Adventist General Conference Annual Council on Tuesday, an event that was held in Maryland, United States of America.

Speaking on his experience as a Baptist member, Adeleke narrated how he ran into difficulties with ‘difficult government officials’, and a particular official telling him that the project would never ‘see the light of day’.

According to him, he went on his knees and prayed to God because he did not want to believe what the government official’s statement said as as the final verdict for his company, Pacific Energy which was working side by side with Chinese engineering companies for the construction and design of the power projects.

He said: “I am a businessman in Nigeria. I’m into the electricity business. I own a power plant, I generate about 15 per cent of the electricity needs for Nigeria. I have Chinese engineering companies that work for me. I’m building the biggest power plant in Nigeria that will be completed in January 2025. It is a 1,250-megawatt power plant.

“During the course of the design and getting the permit, we ran into difficult government officials. For environmental reasons, our permit was denied, and the particular government officials that I held a meeting with told me to my face that my project would never see the light of the day. But while he was saying that, I was saying in my mind that this guy is talking as if he is God. I was saying in my mind that God should listen to him; Because he is not God, whatever he is saying is null and void.

“So I left, disappointed and I told my Chinese friends that unfortunately we have difficulty and this project is going to stall. Meanwhile, the project is worth about $2 billion. In the process, a lot of money had already gone into the design and preliminaries. Before we get to the stage where we would need a permit and then break ground. So my Chinese friend was worried because the Afrexim Bank of China was involved so that meant bankruptcy for him. I told him not to worry.”

Adeleke further disclosed that his Chinese friend had to travel down to Nigeria to look for a way out because he never believed that prayer alone will save him but the project sailed through as the then Minister of Power granted the approval because he saw that the project was a good one.