Adedeji Adeleke, the father of award-winning music maestro, David, fondly called Davido, has disclosed how he went the whole hog to secure environmental permit for his power plant worth over $2 billion.
The billionaire capitalist disclosed this while speaking as a Layperson from the West-Central Africa Division during the Seventh Day Adventist General Conference Annual Council on Tuesday, which was held in Maryland, United States of America.
The industrialist disclosed that the power plant project would be completed in January 2025.
While also sharing his experience as a Baptist member, Adeleke recounted the bottlenecks he encountered with ‘difficult government officials who told him that the project would never materialise.
He said that with determination, he prayed to God to cancel the government official’s stance which would work against his company, Pacific Energy, which was working with Chinese engineering companies for the construction and design of the power projects.
“I am a businessman in Nigeria. I’m into 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, the industrialist said.
He added: “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 not 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,” he said.
Adeleke disclosed that his Chinese friend had to travel to Nigeria to discuss a way out because he believed that the prayer he offered would not be enough but it was answered as the then Minister of Power granted the approval because of its huge prospects.
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