690 power equipment retrieved from ports

The Federal Government has retrieved 690 of the over 800 power equipment containers abandoned at various ports by the previous administration, Minister of Information Lai Mohammaed said yesterday.

Also yesterday, a Senate committee on oversight function to Lagos said the Federal Government, lawmakers and power agencies would meet on how to jointly address the power sector’s problems.

Featuring on a Radio Nigeria programme, “Politics Nationwide”, Mohammaed said: “You will remember that about 800 containers of power equipment were abandoned at the ports, because the previous administration did not pay the contractors.

“As of today, we have been able to retrieve 690 of the containers,’’ he said.

The minister said despite the shoddy privatisation process of the Power Generation Companies (GenCos) and Power Distribution Companies (DisCos) by the previous government, the President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration had taken pro-active measures to improve on electricity.

“When we came in 2015, we found out that many of the beneficiary companies of the privatisation process were undercapitalised, unequipped and they lack the necessary expertise.

“We, however, resisted the temptation of cancelling the privatisation of the GenCos and DisCos in order not to send wrong signal to the investing world.

“What we met on ground was very chaotic because the gas suppliers said they would not supply the GenCos with gas because GenCos were not paying.

“The GenCos said they would have loved to pay but the DisCos were not paying them,’’ he said.

To salvage the situation, Mohammed said the government set aside a N7.1 billion Payment Assurance Programme.

He said the programme guaranteed that as long as the suppliers supplied gas and GenCos generated power for distribution, the government would pay them.

Mohammed said the policy led to increase in power generation from about 4,000 megawatts they met in 2015 to more than 7,000 megawatts being generated currently.

He said the government had made intervention fund available for the take off of the 3,050 megawatts Mambilla hydro-electric plant project which would commence in early 2019.

Also on power generation, the minister said the 2.4 megawatts solar power project in Katsina would be inauguirated in the next few weeks.

The minister said the total capacity for power transmission in 2015 was 4,000mw which the Buhari government had increased to 7,125mw in three and half years.

Mohammed also said that government had embarked on distribution expansion programme to help the capacities of DisCos in meeting the needs of electricity consumers.

Chairman, Senate Committee on Power, Steel Development and Metallurgy, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe, said yesterday during an oversight visit to Ikeja Electric Plc, noted that the issues militating against effective delivery of services by power generating companies and power distribution companies should be addressed the government.

He said that identified gray areas in the power sector should be taken care of by the government, National Assembly and other stakeholders.

He said, “And this is what this committee will have to engage the Minister of Power, the Distribution companies and the Government of Nigerian on how to resolve the issues.

“Merely coming out to blame these companies for inefficiency does not resolve the problem. And that is why we insist that the right things are going to be done.”

He noted that perhaps, most Nigerians do not know that 40 per cent of the Discos are owned by the Federal Government and our responsibility as representatives of the people is also to find out how these agencies are doing.

He said, “We have been briefed by the chief executive and senior staff of Ikeja Electric Plc and we have also seen the constraints under which they work on, and we have taken note of the difficult operating environment of the Distribution companies.

“Essentially what Nigerians want is that with privatisation, there should be a difference between Power Hold Company of Nigeria (PHCN) and the successor companies, 11 of them, in terms of provision of power, in terms of improvement of services, in terms of also cash flow that comes back to government for its investment and also what has come out of the divestment as a public policy.

“We know that there are growing pains as a result of this privatisation. But our conviction is that we didn’t make a mistake in privatising these companies.”

The Chief Executive Officer of Ikeja Electric Dr. Anthong Youdeowei said “the way forward is not something we can solve on our own. It is what the government and all stakeholders have to do.

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The CEO said the Ikeja DisCo generates N6.2b monthly up from the N3billion monthly generated at takeover

“But all that does not stay with us here. Technically, DISCOs are like collection agents right now we collect N6.2 billion monthly.”

On metering, he said they met 600,000 gap and were committed to closing the gap.

The CEO said they invested N53 billion out of which N20billion went to metering.

He blamed paucity of fund for their inability to meter all consumers.

Youdeowei said, “The loss in 2016 according to our audited reports stood at N65 billion. The problem is that the invoicing system is not correct. Its like buying at N10 and selling at N6. There is inbuilt losses. So there is no chance of paying dividends to investors, absolutely no chance.

“What hit everyone, which we did not envisage is the devalution of the Naira and the recession.

“By November, it will be five years when the BPE is supposed to re-evaluate but have shifted it to 2019, due to the challenges.

“The cost has changed but the tariff remained.  NBET is invoicing us at the rate of N360 to the dollar but we are stuck to charging at the rate of N198 to the dollar.”