By Secrets Reporters
The difference between the two payments is one kobo. On 23 April 2024, the Rural Electrification Agency paid JRB Solar Investment Ltd the sum of N626,121,074.56. On 4 December 2024, the same agency paid B.Solar Energy Limited the sum of N626,121,074.57. Two unrelated companies, two separate contracts, eight months apart, and the totals agree to within a single kobo.
The payment to JRB Solar Investment Ltd was for the provision and establishment of high output solar street lights across selected locations in the six geopolitical zones, on a record that names the North East. The record states no quantity of lights. One week later, on 30 April 2024, the agency paid JRB Solar Investment Ltd a further N233,979,840.35 under the same project description, taking the company’s receipts in the tenure of the Managing Director, Abba Abubakar Aliyu, to N860,100,914.91. Aliyu took office on 7 March 2024.
The payment to B.Solar Energy Limited was made against certificate number 1 for the supply and installation of 633 solar security lights in Kogi and Ilorin. The certificate prices the lights. A total of N626,121,074.57 for 633 lights works out at N989,133 for each light.
The payment records do not allow the same calculation for JRB Solar Investment Ltd, because its identical sum was paid on a record that states no quantity at all. What the records establish is the identical total, paid twice, to two companies with no connection shown between them.
JRB Solar Investment Ltd is on the register of the Corporate Affairs Commission as JRB Solar Investment Limited, RC 872046, incorporated on 23 February 2010, with an active status. SecretsReporters searched the Commission’s public register for B.Solar Energy Limited, the company that received the same money against the priced certificate. The register returned no record of the company. Section 16 of the Public Procurement Act 2007 makes registration with the Corporate Affairs Commission one of the conditions a company must meet to qualify for federal contracts.
Solar street lights are the largest single line of spending in Aliyu’s tenure. The agency made 260 street light payments totalling N15,826,653,868 between March 2024 and June 2026. Across those 260 payments, the quantities supplied are stated in almost none of the records, so the price of a light can be tested in only a handful of cases. One of them is the B.Solar certificate, at N989,133 per light. The only other street light payment in the tenure that states a countable quantity was made to Off Grid Limited on 26 February 2025, for 58 lights at a total of N15,615,990, which is N269,241 per light, on a description carrying a different specification. Off Grid Limited is registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission, RC 1349143, incorporated on 20 July 2016, with an active status.
