President Goodluck Jonathan has approved N130bn for the payment of the terminal benefits of workers of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria, who may be sacked in the ongoing reforms in the power sector.



The Director-General, Bureau of Public Enterprises, Ms. Bolanle Onagoruwa, disclosed this at a one-day workshop on power reforms organised by the agency in Abuja on Tuesday.



The agency has also said that Nigerians are paying two times more for electricity as a result of inefficiency of the PHCN.



Onagoruwa said, ”Mr. President has approved that N130bn be set aside in the supplementary budget for the full payment of all financial benefits that will accrue to the PHCN workers that will be affected in the process of the reform in the sector.



“The need to fast-track the reform programme becomes imperative to improve efficiency, reduce losses and cost. No doubt, the reform will increase access to electricity, engender private sector investment, improve infrastructure and generate employment for the growing population of graduates.”



She said the power shortage in the country, despite the Federal Government‘s frequent financial interventions, was fast becoming intolerable.



According to her, available information indicates that all the plants in the unbundled PHCN are in poor condition with several of the units and supporting services completely down.



She added, ”There are also capacity constraints in the transmission and distribution networks requiring significant investments, which only private sector involvement can guarantee through modern technology and management.



”Despite the massive investment by the Federal Government, the transmission and distribution capacity is still below 4,000 megawatts.



”On the massive decay in the sector, industry experts estimate that the sum of $40bn (N6tn) will be required to meet Nigeria‘s electric power requirement between now and 2020.”



In a presentation, the Project Manager, Electric Power Sector Reform, BPE, Mr. Amaechi Aloke, said Nigerians were paying twice more for inefficiencies in the power sector.



According to Aloke, about 50 per cent of the power generated in the country is lost and this means that the tariff paid by consumers is two times what they should pay if the system were to be efficient.



However, through the Multi-Year-Tariff-Order evolved by the National Electricity Regulatory Commission, the Federal Government is absolving part of the tariff through the injection of subsidies.



On the state of the electricity industry, Aloke said it was characterised by low generation, distribution and transmission capacities; lack of commercial orientation, poor maintenance culture, frequent power outages and large number of employees.



He said it was regrettable that the accounts of PHCN had not been audited in the last six years, adding that no commercial business would accept such a situation.



Meanwhile, the Federal Government has called on the National Union of Electricity Employees to call off their planned strike over alleged disagreement emanating from the payment of monetisation arrears to workers.



The Minister of Labour and Productivity, Chief Emeka Nworgu, said that the strike was unnecessary as the Federal Government had fulfilled its side of the deal with the workers by paying the monitisation arrears of 82.6 per cent of the workers.


http://www.punchng.com/Articl.aspx?theartic=Art20100929333768

THANK GOD FOR OUR PRESIDENT’S INITIATIVE ON THIS REPORT.IF, AND ONLY IF,ACURATE TERMINAL BENEFITS AND SEVERANCE ALLOWANCES OF WORKERS TO BE AFFECTED ARE SINCERLY CALCULATED, VALID CHEQUES DUELY PREPARED, THEN,THOSE MOST LIKELY AFFECTED MAY WISH THE NEW ARRANGEMENT WELL, EVEN WITH THEIR LETTERS ON ONE HAND AND VALID CHEQUES ON THE OTHER AS THEY SMILE HOME.

chei PDP Share the money, make i go collect my own, thanks baba j

at lease this will flush out bad eggs in the power sector

Lol! PHCN just threatened GEJ that they'd put the whole country in black-out during the Nigeria@50 celebrations!, and he paid!   . I hope PHCN isn't turning out to be GEJ's soft spot, they never had it so good, lol!!

This is bad, this is really really bad, 130 billion to be free. This is an unbelieveable cost and I hope those who collect the cheques can live with it. Can you imagine the cost of winding down a corporation that has caused so much pain and loss to people for so long. Who will write them cheques. I don't care what anyone says. We should not be paying for failure, civil service or not. We also work and we employ people and we would not break our backs to pay for losses. This is why the government should have acted years ago before this monster became so large. Now we are forced to smell the rot of an elephant instead of an ant. The government should just get the hell out of all enterprises now. 130 billion is just shy of 1 billion dollars. For what.

marger done pay.

130 billion is just shy of 1 billion dollars

Kai, 9ja get plenty money o

THANK GOD FOR OUR PRESIDENT’S INITIATIVE ON THIS REPORT.IF, AND ONLY IF,ACURATE TERMINAL BENEFITS AND SEVERANCE ALLOWANCES OF WORKERS TO BE AFFECTED ARE SINCERLY CALCULATED, VALID CHEQUES DUELY PREPARED, THEN,THOSE MOST LIKELY AFFECTED MAY WISH THE NEW ARRANGEMENT WELL, EVEN WITH THEIR LETTERS ON ONE HAND AND VALID CHEQUES ON THE OTHER AS THEY SMILE HOME.




U can say that again

Reference:

This is bad, this is really really bad, 130 billion to be free. This is an unbelieveable cost and I hope those who collect the cheques can live with it. Can you imagine the cost of winding down a corporation that has caused so much pain and loss to people for so long. Who will write them cheques. I don't care what anyone says. We should not be paying for failure, civil service or not. We also work and we employ people and we would not break our backs to pay for losses. This is why the government should have acted years ago before this monster became so large. Now we are forced to smell the rot of an elephant instead of an ant. The government should just get the hell out of all enterprises now. 130 billion is just shy of 1 billion dollars. For what.

SO WHAT ARE YOU SUGGESTING ?