BREAKING: Total electricity blackout hits Rivers, two other Nigerian states

Rivers, Bayelsa and Imo states have been thrown into total blackout as the Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN, announced a forced outage on its Alaoji 132-kilovolt transmission line.

A statement by TCN spokesperson, Ndidi Mbah, said the forced outage occurred around 3:39 am on Tuesday.

TCN attributed the outage to an earth fault and distance protection failure at the Alaoji transmission line.

As a result, Port Harcourt Electricity Distribution Company, PHEDC, has been unable to off-take electricity for distribution to its customers in Owerri, Yenagoa and Ahoada in Imo, Bayelsa and Rivers states, respectively.

“The Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) wishes to inform the public that there was a forced outage on the Alaoji 132kV Transmission Line at about 3:59am today, Tuesday, June 23, 2026, due to an earth fault and distance protection failure.

“TCN’s maintenance crew has since swung into action and is currently working on the line to ensure that normal bulk power supply is restored as quickly as possible.

“Consequently, the Port Harcourt Electricity Distribution Company (PHEDC) has been unable to off-take electricity supply for distribution to its customers in Owerri, Yenagoa, and Ahoada.

“TCN apologizes for any inconvenience this outage will cause affected electricity customers,” TCN stated.