Tuesday. Less light. Ikeja Electric cut supply hours. It blamed a shortfall in the power allocated to its network from the national grid.

In Ogun, the Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company, IBEDC, announced a load restriction on its Ota, Papa and Abeokuta 132kV network. Customers in Abeokuta, Ifo, Ilaro, Papalanto and other areas may get reduced supply, it warned.

The system operator's data put allocation to the 11 distribution companies at 3,998MW. Neither statement explains what caused the lower allocation.

How does that compare? On 22 September the National Control Centre's schedule showed 4,379MW going to the distribution companies at 8:07pm, from 5,403MW available. Ikeja's share was 581MW. But Tuesday's figure comes with no time attached. It isn't a clean comparison.

The government's account is the bigger picture. Power Minister Joseph Tegbe, at his 100-day briefing on 21 September, said generation and transmission had stayed above 5,000MW in recent weeks. Peak, 5,330MW. He admitted the gains hadn't reached most homes.

The sector is owed about ₦3.3 trillion, he said. Government ministries, departments and agencies alone owe more than ₦100 billion for power used. Unpaid bills starve gas supply and maintenance, he said, and unreliable supply cuts collections. He ruled out an immediate tariff increase.

That's his account of the sector's problem. It isn't an explanation for Tuesday's shortfall.

15 September. The Peoples Gazette reported outages of three to five days across Lagos. An X user asked why Akoka had no light since Friday midnight, calling it "Day 4 of no light." Ikeja Electric blamed significant limits on the transmission network.

What's coming? On 30 September the ministry said it was talking to distribution companies, Ikeja Electric and IBEDC among them, about Energy Zones with round-the-clock supply. First stops would be the Lagos axis, Abuja-Kaduna-Kano and Enugu-Port Harcourt. No start date appears in the report.

Lagos's regulator has separately planned a pilot of 24/7 franchise zones from October.