The celebration of the 2020 Commonwealth Day at the Federal Ministry of Education secretariat in Abuja on Monday could not hold due to power outage which lasted for several hours at the ministry.
Despite the arrival of key officials of the diplomatic community, heads of agencies and students from at least 10 schools in the Federal Capital Territory, the programme, scheduled to start by 11am, could not start as a result of the power failure.
Our correspondent observed that guests and students were kept in the dark for hours, after which the ministry later announced at about 1pm that the Commonwealth celebration would hold at another venue – the National Commission for Colleges of Education, Central Area.
“Attention, gentlemen, please the venue for the Commonwealth celebration has been shifted from the federal ministry to NCCE, opposite the Ministry of Finance. Thank you,” the education ministry said in a message.
An official of the education ministry, who did not want his name in print, said the power cut was caused by a fault in the generator.
“The organisers had difficulty in powering the generator and also its back-up. The director in charge of the programme had instructed officials in charge of logistics to carry out due diligence, but this was not done. Hence, the failure of the programme to hold as scheduled,” he stated.
Our correspondent observed how diplomats and permanent secretaries of the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Education left the hall as a result of the outage.
The items listed in the Commonwealth Day celebration, which could not hold, were parade of the Commonwealth flags, presentation of theme songs, poetry recitation, drama presentation, cultural dance and exhibitions.