On Monday, locals from Lagos State’s Abule Oja and Abule Ijesha staged a protest over power outage at the Ikeja Electric headquarters in Igbobi, demonstrating against a situation they had been subjected to since November 2025.
The protesters which consisted of mostly students and young adults held placards and cardboards that had inscriptions such as, Stop the suffering! Restore our light”, “#EndTheBlackout”, “Band B = 16 hours daily. Deliver it!” “#LightUpAbuleOja”, “#PowerUpIjesha”, “Abule Oja/Ijesha is not invisible!” “Why are we being punished?” “Power is a right, not a privilege”.
ENigeria Newspaper gathered this from an FIJ report which further referenced a report back in February and March on how the students and people in these villages struggled on power outage for months.
The report confirmed that some of the locals had gone to the Ikeja Electric office a few times and met with authorities to complain about the power supply condition.
Having got no positive feedback or result, they organized a nonviolent protest and marched to the company’s office.
At the protest ground, the manager informed them that the main problem started in November 2025 as a result of transmission cable vandalism. Additionally, he clarified that the communities were served by a single feeder and that there was not enough electricity to fully power every feeder. The company then used load shedding to rotate power throughout the areas due to a low supply. Therefore, some locations might receive little or no electricity at all if the supply was too low.
One of the protesters told journalists that the manager had given a time frame so they could work on the issues.
“The manager said residents should give them about two weeks to see improvement. We, the residents, also expressed that we have been patient for months. The situation is affecting businesses, food storage and daily life.
“We want consistent and stable electricity in reasonable supply, not minutes. Further delay without improvement is unacceptable,” he added.
Protests over power outage
Just last week, residents of Maya Olorijo Estate in the Ikorodu area of Lagos State, staged a peaceful protest over a prolonged power outage that has persisted for about 18 months.
The demonstrators said the extended blackout has disrupted economic activities, weakened livelihoods, and created severe hardship within the community.
Last month, residents of Gowon Estate in the Egbeda area of Lagos staged a protest over a long power outage that has affected several streets in the community. The protesters proceeded to the office of Ikeja Electric in the Ponle area to complain about the situation and asked the company to restore electricity to their homes.
