Stakeholders in the nation’s power sector have expressed divergent views on the call by the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress, Bola Tinubu, for the Federal Government to revisit the privatisation of the sector.
The Federal Government handed over the nation’s generation and distribution companies to private investors on November 1, 2013, following the unbundling of the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria.
Tinubu, at the 11th Bola Tinubu Colloquium in Abuja on Thursday, urged the government to revisit the privatisation of the sector, saying the country could not afford to be too legalistic about it.
He advised the government to bring experts together for a more constructive reform to improve power generation, transmission and distribution by any means necessary.
He also said the government should push for an end to the practice of estimated billing, adding that people were being forced to pay for the electricity they did not consume.
He described estimated billing as “a vestige of the past that should not accompany Nigerians into the future.”
Tinubu said, “I believe the second Buhari administration will work to increase electricity generation, transmission and distribution by more than 50 per cent within the next four years. It is a challenge we must go through and we will be held responsible for it. We require serious and bold reforms to achieve this.
The Nigeria Union of Electricity Employees described Tinubu’s call for a revisiting of the power sector privatisation as a welcome development.
The General Secretary, NUEE, Joe Ajaero said, “If Tinubu is saying what we have said some years ago now, it then means that more Nigerians are beginning to see what we foresaw. The NUEE was clear about the issue of privatisation, and we never bought into it.
“There was a provision for the review of the sector after five years and that was to happen in November last year, but there was a criminal silence at expiration. What is the level of investment in the sector? There should be a national debate to see whether we have made progress.”
The Executive Director, Research and Advocacy, Association of Nigerian Electricity Distributors, Sunday Oduntan, said, “For us, as operators in the sector, we are not really interested in the politics of power supply; we are interested in supplying power. I think the privatisation process was done openly. There was a process; they (government) even went round the world looking for investors.
“The Disco investors that I represent paid a sum of $1.4bn for the entities, and we have always been talking about the challenges in the sector. For us, we will continue to cooperate with the Federal Government to ensure there is an improvement in the sector.”
Oduntan said, “The current Federal Government has done a lot to improve the lot of the power sector, and we have no doubt that more power will be delivered to Nigerians. And that is what we are interested in.
Tinubu also said an increase in Value Added Tax would reduce the spending power of the people and might inflict more hardships on them.
He urged the government to rather consider widening the tax net so that people who had not been paying taxes would start to pay taxes.
Tinubu said in working to transform the economy, the government must also enact policies that would encourage industrialisation and modern agricultural practices.
According to him, government-funded social security for the aged and government-backed affordable housing and mortgage facilities are things that it must continue to explore in an aggressive manner.
The Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, who represented Buhari at the event, lauded Tinubu for his political sagacity.
He said Buhari’s government was focused on fixing the economy and building infrastructure, adding that the administration had recorded great achievements in education and healthcare development as well as in infrastructural development.
Osinbajo said, “Our country, for the first time, is experiencing the type of leadership that is bound to lead us where it is that we have purposed for ourselves as government. In my view, the honest leadership, the leadership with the integrity of our President – President Muhammadu Buhari – is a very important component of getting anywhere at all in all our development plans.
He added, “You cannot point to a single major infrastructure project that was completed in the 10 years period despite the high revenue, including power. So, a government coming after so many years of waste must be a government that emphasises prudence and integrity in public finance, so that they manage the little resources to achieve the maximum that can be achieved. That is what President Buhari is set out to achieving.
