3rd November, 2010
Despite the protest by members of the Nigerian Union of Electricity Employees, NUEE, against the privatisation of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, Nigerians want the roadmap President Goodluck Jonathan unveiled recently to revamp the power sector to be implemented as soon as possible. The workers argue that if PHCN is privatised, it will result in mass retrenchment of workers and increase in the electricity tariff paid by consumers.
One of the workers’ fears border on the recommendation by the Barth Nnaji-led committee on power reforms that electricity tariff be increased from the current N4 to N22 per kilowatt to attract private investors. Non government organisations have also joined in the protest against the privatisation of PHCN, saying if the wholly owned federal electricity generation and distribution company is privatised, it will suffer the same fate as the Nigerian Telecommunications company, NITEL and other privatised government companies whose staff lost their jobs due to massive retrenchment and non payment of their severance benefits. However, the PHCN workers are not enjoying the sympathy of the vast majority of Nigerians who have been suffering because of the workers’ ineptitude resulting in the appalling and unacceptable power supply situation in the country. The poor electricity supply has also forced the shutting down of over 800 factories. Consequently, thousands of workers have been thrown out of jobs as companies can no longer cope with the huge cost of running their plants virtually on generators.
Many textile companies have folded up. Other companies are relocating to Ghana where there is steady supply of electricity. There are no cottage industries that should employ teeming jobless youths that have graduated from the universities because there is no electricity to power their machines. All these have taken a great toll on the nation’s economy to the extent that Nigerians are in desperate need of a revolution that will bring about a long lasting turn around in the power sector.
It is to this extent that electricity consumers do not share the sentiments of members of NUEE who do not want the power reform plan of the Federal Government to see the light of day. It is not for nothing that PHCN workers are protesting against privatisation. They want the status quo that promotes corruption to remain. The involvement of the private sector will definitely curtail the excesses of the PHCN workers. They want to continue holding Nigerians to ransom. That is why they don’t want their present stranglehold on electricity consumers broken.
Another issue that is also worrisome is that several years after the introduction of prepaid meters by PHCN, millions of Nigerian are yet to benefit from this seeming efficient way of assessing electricity consumed by each household and billing of the household appropriately. Only a fraction of the populace have these prepaid meters. Although those who introduced the prepaid meter billing system expected to stop the arbitrary billing system that shortchanged consumers, staff of PHCN have not allowed it to work because they benefit from the existing order that promotes sharp practices through the manipulation of the old meter to hike the bills for electricity not consumed in most cases. With the old meter billing system, the ‘crazy bill’ syndrome will persist for the benefit of the corrupt PHCN officials.
All the hue and cry about the privatisation of PHCN does not move Nigerians. What the people need is uninterrupted supply of electricity, whether by the government or the private sector.
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