The Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr.
Babatunde Fashola, on Thursday said it was
untrue he described the 2013 privatisation
process for successor generation and distribution
companies of the defunct Power Holding Company
of Nigeria (PHCN) as illegal, saying the newspaper
report which attributed it to him was not factual.

He said in an emailed statement from his senior
aide on communications, Mr. Hakeem Bello, in
Abuja that he did not make such remarks at a
Senate public hearing on electricity tariff.

The Minister in the statement distanced himself
from the alleged pronouncement. He said in
presentations he made before the Senate
Committee, he never used the word ‘illegally’ to
refer to the privatisation of the PHCN by the
federal government.

He said rather, a verified playback of a video
recording of the session, showed he said, “…as
minister, I inherited a power sector where
government interests had been legally sold…”

The minister’s clarification of what he said at the
session with the Senate has however coincided
with reactions from operators of electricity
generation companies (Gencos) and distribution
companies (Discos) on the report, with some of
them expressing their willingness to give up their
assets and claim compensation from the
government if it decides to reverse the
transaction.

According to the statement, Fashola in tracing
how the country got to this point in her power
sector, referred to the privatisation law made in
2005.

He was quoted as saying: “The people of this
country through their parliamentarians made a
verdict in 2005 when you passed that law that
things must change, the law was passed in 2005
and the process was completed in 2013, I wasn’t
here, some of you were here, if the process is bad
where was the oversight.”

He also reportedly said to the Senate: “I will
commend to this committee the report of the
House of Representatives that investigated the
matter. I will also commend to you sirs, some of
the reports that have been made by the Senate
committee on privatisation. The basic reason for
the passage of the power sector reforms bill that
was passed in 2005 is that we all know that the
government was not doing its business well.”

Fashola, it said defended the reform law when he
reportedly said the Senate: “These decisions were
taken before any of us was here. If it was working
why change it, who were the people that were
employed to make it work, it was our employers
in the TUC and other unions, and if they complain
that the dam was not working and the power plant
was not working, that was why they were hired.”

According to the statement, Fashola further
described the power sector reform law as a great
law.


www.thisdaylive.com/index.php/2016/06/02/fashola-denies-saying-phcn-privatisation-was-illegitimate/

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