The Director General
of the Bureau of Public Enterprise (BPE), Mr. Benjamin Dikki revealed to the
House of Representatives committee on Privatisation and Commercialisation that
the full payments of entitlements has begun for the Power Holdings Company of
Nigeria (PHCN) workers.
He also added
that some 6,700 of the staff had issues with verification which is being sorted
out while 2,500 casual workers are expected to be regularized by the PHCN
management before payment of their entitlement.
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| A PHCN installation. Img: Olumide Samuel |
He added that
the bureau has received payment for 14 power generation and distribution
companies that were handed over to private investors about two weeks ago. The government
is almost through in its step to privatize the power sector.
It must be
noted that the government is only privatizing the generation and distribution
companies while the transmission company which is the link between them is
still under the government’s watch. The government claims this will allow it to
still have a reasonable control over how the private investors run the power
companies.
Chairperson of
the House committee, Khadijat Bukar Abba-Ibrahim, commended the BPE on its
success in the handing over of 14 generation and distribution companies to core
investors.
She also
appealed to the bureau and the National Council on Privatisation (NCP) to at
all times “Operate in strict compliance with the Public Enterprises
Privatisation and Commercialisation Act of 1999.”
In a related
news, DG of the BPE, Benjamin Dikki, at an investors’ forum in New York claim
that the Federal Government will make over $3 billion from the sale of 17
successor companies.
He claimed
that about $2.3bn has already been realized from the sale of 60% equity in 14
of the successor companies, whose transactions have been concluded.
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Payments of entitlement of 38,000 PHCN workers has commenced – BPE