Deregulation of Power Tops VP, Govs’ Agenda

Written by Duncan Thursday, 06 October 2011

Determined to achieve a workable agreement between the Federal and state governments on some key reform programmes of the present administration, the National Economic Council (NEC), which is inching closer to full deregulation of the power sector, will meet again today in Abuja. The body will take a critical look at the planned introduction of a Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) and other related issues.

Headed by Vice-President Namadi Sambo, who will preside over the meeting, NEC has the 36 governors; Minister of Finance and the Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala; Minister of Trade and Investment, Olusegun Aganga; Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice, Mr. Mohammed Adoke (SAN); Minister of National Planning, Shamsuddeen Usman; and Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, as members.

THISDAY gathered that the Chairman of the National Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), Dr. Sam Amadi, will be addressing the NEC over a request by Governors of Rivers, Akwa Ibom and Lagos States who want to be major partners in the distribution of the electricity generated by their states in a deregulated power sector regime. 

The state helmsmen, THISDAY further gathered, have slated a follow-up meeting for next week to review the outcome of today’s meeting with an indication that another meeting would hold between the governors and President Goodluck Jonathan between Saturday and Monday. This is expected to be an avenue to find a mutual solution on the SWF to stave off legal litigations as some of the governors have preferred.

According to a governor, who spoke to THISDAY in confidence, the NEC meeting would continue where the governors and Okonjo-Iweala stopped in their last meeting which was stalemated due to the inability of the governors and the minister to reach agreement on the operation and implementation of the proposed Fund.

The governor, who was positive that an agreement might be reached between them and the Presidency, said: “From the meetings so far held between the governors and the committee set up to review the proposed operational framework of the Fund, one can say that there would be a meeting point between the governors and the Federal Government.

“The basic problems some of us have with the Fund are trust and misappropriation. We fear a situation the Federal Government will starve the states of funds, especially during election.

“We are asking for a situation where the states would not be starved of funds in their daily operations. A situation where a governor spends over 75 per cent of the total revenue of a state on merely 50,000 workers is not ideal. There is a state that was paying N9,000 minimum wage since 2007 with a monthly allocation of less than N3.2 billion; how can the same state pay a minimum wage of N18, 000 with the same N3.2 billion. These are verifiable issues and there are no sentiments.”

The governor said the meeting with the vice-president would address, in detail, the states’ challenges and constraints in the implementation of the minimum wage.

According to him, “…though we see reason that the implementation of the Fund is necessary to avoid a bleak future, but there must be a meeting point to enable the governors execute some of their physical projects.”
Okonjo-Iweala in her last meeting with the governors had informed them that the non-implementation of the Fund could spell doom for the country in times of world economic crisis as witnessed in 2009 and 2010.

The governor also said that another item on the agenda of today’s meeting is the address by the Chief Executive Officer of NERC, Amadi.
He explained that at their last meeting with the NERC chairman, the governors had demanded that the implementation of the new tariff on electricity be put on hold pending the resolution of outstanding issues.

One of the outstanding issues, the governor said, was their request for the deregulation of the electricity tariff, explaining that some states that had commenced the production of electricity in their respective states are asking that they become part of the distribution network.

It was gathered that the outcome of today’s meeting will form the basis of the meeting which the governors would be holding by next Tuesday.
Meanwhile, as part of today’s meeting, the governors will also have a dialogue with the Federal Government on how they could pay their counterpart funding in order for them to access the over N34 billion locked up in the Universal Basic Education (UBE) fund.

Speaking to newsmen after the NEC sub-committee meeting, Governor of Adamawa State, Murtala Nyako, said the governors were aware of the importance of basic education and were therefore striving to map out modalities for raising the counterpart funding.

Nyako described as false, the information that some of them were trying to circumvent making their mandatory contributions in order to access the fund, pointing out that since the Fund was an assistance to states in funding basic education, there was no way they could start asking for waivers.

He explained that the sub-committee had already arrived at some conclusions on the matter and would brief the enlarged house today when NEC meets on what might be a single agenda for the Council.

Comments (0)

Show/hide comments

Show/hide comment form