27 September 2013, Abuja – The Federal Government has announced plans to start physical handover of the successor companies of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, to the new owners by November.
Dr Godknows Igali the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Power, disclosed this to State House correspondents, after a meeting with Vice President Namadi Sambo at the Presidential Villa.
It would be recalled the PHCN was unbundled into 15 successor companies comprising five Generation Companies, GENCOs, and 10 Distribution Companies, DISCOs.
The National Council on Privatisation, NCP, last week ratified the sale of the 10 DISCOs and four of the five GENCOs to preferred bidders which made full payments for the assets.
The council had said that it did not ratify the sale of Sapele GENCO because the preferred bidder did not pay in full for the asset.
Igali said that prior to the physical hand over of the plants, there would be a formal ceremony for the hand over of documents to the new owners.
He said that the ceremony would be presided over by President Goodluck Jonathan.
Igali said that his ministry had also made significant progress in the payment severance to PHCN workers.
“We are making very good progress in ensuring that all workers are paid.
“When you are dealing with paying accounts of workers, over 40,000 people, you have to be careful because it is not something you rush into.
“So, we think that when the formal hand over of the documents is done, we still have another one month to ensure that we look into claims and so on, before the final physical take off.’’
It will be recalled that NCP had also last week approved the immediate release of fund through the Accountant General of the Federation to clear off all the outstanding payments to PHCN workers.
The council said that N384 billion had been set aside for the settlement of the 49,000 workers to benefit from the severance.
Igali re-assured that the future remained bright for Nigerian electricity consumers.
He said that power supply was expected to improve significantly when the new owners would take over as being witnessed in the privatised telecommunications sector.
*NAN
