Reps ask FG to suspend sale of Niger Delta Power Holding Company assets

The house of representatives has asked the federal government to suspend the planned privatisation of the Niger Delta Power Holding Company (NDPHC) assets.

The resolution of the lower legislative chamber followed the adoption of a motion sponsored by Kayode Musbau from Lagos.

While moving his motion during plenary session on Thursday, Musbau said the federal government in 2013 announced plans to sell the assets to fund renewable power generation.

He said the NDPHC belongs to the three tiers of government and not exclusively to the federal government.

“In 2005, the National Council of State and the National Assembly approved initial funding of US$25 billion for NIPP from the Excess Crude Oil Account (ECOA) which statutorily belongs to the Federal, State and Local governments,” he said.

“In 2013, the Federal Government announced the proposed privatisation of some NIPP power plants which are owned by the NDPHC, with a plan to reinvest the proceeds in developing renewable power generation projects, however, myriad of challenges that bedevilled the power sector mitigated against the effort”.

The lawmaker said the government has not taken “some vital issues into consideration such as the applicable policy, and the appropriate legal framework or legislation under which the transactions will be implemented, as well as the laws relating to procurement or disposal of shares and assets, given the shareholding of the states and local governments.

“The Bureau for Public Enterprise (BPE) recently announced the proposed sale of five (5) NIPP assets in Cross River, Edo, Ondo, Ogun and Kogi States with the aim of using the proceeds to fund the Federal Government budget deficit,” he said.

Musbau said the proposed sale of the asset should be suspended to allow the contending issue of ownership to be resolved.

“In April 2021, the Board of Directors of the Niger Delta Power Holding Company Limited (NDPHC) agreed to resolve all issues mitigating against the sale of the assets and considered a special budgetary intervention of One Hundred Million Dollars ($100,000,000) for improved offtake of the sate of NDPHC’s stranded power.

He added that the Joint Transaction Board (JTB), which was created to handle the snare sale transaction of NIPP power plants, “did not approve the sale of five power plants.”

The motion was adopted after it was put to a voice vote by Femi Gbajabiamila, speaker of the house.

The green chamber mandated its committees on power and privatisation and commercialisation to investigate the matter and report back within four weeks.