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The proposed privatization of the power
sector, which the federal authorities and lawmakers have said is
irreversible, will consume the jobs of about 50,000 employees of the
Power Holding Company of Nigeria, but the government says N135 billion
is being reserved for them.

Bart Nnaji, the special adviser to
President Goodluck Jonathan on power, listed before the members of the
House of Representatives yesterday, a barrage of failures in the
sector, which he said for years found little or no investment, and the
little that came, was almost spent on staff salaries and pension.

The total workforce is about 50,000.
The operating cost is over N8 billion – of which more than 80% goes
into staff entitlements, according to a presentation Mr. Nnaji made
before the House power committee, attended by the speaker, Dimeji
Bankole.

The Power Reform Roadmap, launched
about a month ago by Mr. Jonathan, targets raising the level of
investments in the sector, which has hovered at low levels, suffering
the worst of funding between 1989 and 1996, according to Mr. Nnaji.

Investments between those years averaged at about US$0, with 2001 drawing the highest of US$400 million since 1974.

Chief amongst government’s plan to
overhaul the sector will be to disengage almost all the workers, as the
PHCN becomes privatised, with a proposed severance package of $900
million reserved for the workers.

“There are areas which we want you to
help us and the issue with labour,” Mr. Nnaji told the lawmakers at a
meeting that aimed at canvassing lawmakers support to restart the
suspended Electricity Power Sector Reform Act, 2005.

“We have laid out a plan for dealing
with labour in a way that will bring comfort to anybody that is an
employee with PHCN. So that in this partnership, that the NASS help us
to educate the workers and the Nigerian public.” Mr. Nnaji said.

In his response, Mr. Bankole faulted
the presidency for launching the reform without the collaboration of
the National Assembly, and accused the government of frustrating a
power probe carried out by the House as he took reins in 2007.

“We were not consulted when you were
putting this together, and I think that is the first problem with this
document. The power issue is not an executive problem, it is a
government problem and, therefore, the legislature and the executive
should be sitting to brainstorm before even this document comes up.

“Because we have spent a better time of
this session on the power sector for almost two years in the House and
we came up with some conclusions and those reports were sent to the
executive. Till today, I don’t know of any executive team that have
consulted the House on that report, and I know that the executive will
spend more money on the power sector since that time, and yet there is
no power,” Mr. Bankole complained.

The report was suspended in the House
after the power committee, initially headed by Ndudi Elumelu, indicted
key past and present government officials. A new committee raised by
Mr. Bankole exonerated the officials who included the former president,
Olusegun Obasanjo, and the Cross River State governor, Liyel Imoke.

Mr. Bankole said the sector had failed
due to lack of consultations between the executive and the legislature.
He made a case for Nigerians who will lose jobs when power supply is
improved.