Those who are concerned
about the systematic killing of the two anti-graft institutions by top
governmental officials for their selfish reasons, may not be wrong after all.
Reason: the Economic and
Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), one among the two anti-graft bodies, known
for being much more active than its lazy counterpart-the Independent Corrupt
Practices and Allied offences commission (ICPC), is reportedly broke and can
not pay her huge bills owed to the few private solicitors that perennially handle
their cases.
On the other hand, the
ICPC which is more or less a toothless bull dog has almost being grounded to a
ruthless stop due largely to leadership inertia, incapacity and total lack of
charisma on the part of their leaders/hierarchy to wage war against
corruption.
Painfully, the
near-demise of these strategic publicly funded anti-graft agencies coincided
with the period whereby large scale cases of corruption and economic crimes
have manifested among public office holders especially in the electricity power
sector embroiled with wide spread allegation of under- hand dealings in the
ongoing privatization of publicly owned Electricity power firms to some private
business persons drawn largely from suspected fronts of top government
officials.
Apart from the
electricity power sector, another segment of the nation’s
economy entangled in corruption and large scale economic crimes is
the pension scheme especially the Nigerian police's pension scheme in which
cases of theft of over N32 Billion are ongoing at ridiculously snail -speed by
the EFCC at various Federal High Courts against top government officials drawn
from the office of Head of Service of the federation including a serving
permanent secretary in the Nigerian Presidency.
In this piece however,
our attention will dwell extensively on the process of privatizing various
electricity power plants to private buyers most of whom are allegedly linked to
top government officials in the presidency. The wife of President Jonathan and
the vice President Mr. Namadi Sambo have both been linked to the company
purportedly run by Chief Emeka Offor that reportedly took over the Enugu
Electricity Company. They have all but denied these widespread allegations.
One question that has
yet to be answered is why these two anti-graft institutions were
surreptitiously crippled and rendered incapacitated about the same time that
this corruption-ridden transfer of Nigeria’s electricity power firms to the
private sector is happening?
Secondly, facts emerged
that the power firms belonging to the people of Nigeria were sold by the
current government for N404 billion even when collectively these plants gulped
N3.2 trillion of tax payers money to fix back to optimal functional shape.
Why should Nigeria sell
off these vital electricity power plants at these ridiculous rates even after
injecting enormous quantity of public fund to revive and/or modernize them
therefore making it look as if they were sold at the laughable rate of two for
– One Kobo?
I ask, which wise
man/woman wanting to dispose off his/her old car will almost spend a fortune
good enough to purchase a brand new car just so as to fix the old vehicle for
the purposes of selling it off at very ridiculous give-away
price? This will surely be termed penny-wise-pound foolish.
Before providing further
and better published proofs of the above claim, let me draw the attention of
the reading public that the names of the private sector buyers that have or are
now possessing these power plants are the same persons that have featured in
virtually all the privatization transactions that have ever happened ever since
this widely criticized privatization policy was implemented right from the days
of President Olusegun Obasanjo up until the current dispensation.
What the above point
demonstrates is that the privatization exercise may be less than transparent
even as equity and fair play never took place in the whole scenario.
Now to the important but
irritating fact that government spent N3.2 trillion to fix the power plants but
sold them N404 billion, one of the nation’s newspapers known for investigative
stories- Daily Trust recently published huge volumes of evidence to
prove this allegation in its Tuesday October 1st 2013 edition.
In very specific and
unambiguous presentation, Daily Trust reports that on the last day of
September, 2013 the federal government handed over its spun off power companies
to private buyers who paid a total of N404 billion to acquire assets into which
investment of over N3.2 trillion was made in the past 14 years. Government
presented share certificates and licences to the new owners of six power
generation companies and nine distribution firms that reportedly completed
payment of their bid amounts.
Those public companies
now sold were among the 18 successors of the now moribund Power Holden Company
of Nigeria (PHCN).
PHCN was broken up in a
privatization process that is aimed at ending debilitating power shortage in
the country, Daily Trust reported.
At least N3.2 trillion
(about $ 20 billion) has gone into several power reform programmes in the past
14 years of civilian rule, much of it wasted, so says the newspaper.
The PHCN was split into
six generation, 11 distribution and one transmission companies.
All the generating and
distributing firms were sold separately for N$2.5 billion (about N404 billion)
in total.
A House of
Representatives inquiry in 2008-2009 found that at least $15 billion dollars
had been spent in the power sector, most of it stolen, with no commensurate
result.
So I ask, why the
privatization exercise if ultimately the country would have to cough out huge
sums of public fund to fix the power firms just so that these favoured private
buyers can have them at give -away- prices? This is certainly absurd.
Were the rules governing
privatization that complies to global best practices followed and if yes, is
the exercise not a total negation of the economic objectives of Nigeria as
enshrined in chapter two of the Nigerian constitution which frowns at
economically empowering only but few Nigerians at the expense of the greatest
happiness of the greater population of Nigeria?
In his book titled; “Privatization
and public good: the rule of law challenge”,Dr. Sam Amadi had as far
back as year 2008 warned thus; “Regulation is one process of ensuring that
something close to a perfect market exists after privatization. Again,
regulation helps to overcome the dangers of privatization, including that
privatization may become a process of creating a monopoly or entrenching an
unfair market power”.
If truth be told, the
process of selling off publicly owned electricity power plants built at very
high rate and later sold at ridiculous amount to same persons in the private
sector associated with all the privatization exercises since the last 14 years,
is less than transparent and indeed violates relevant section of the Nigerian
constitution including but not limited to section 16(2) (c) which provides that
"the Nigerian state shall direct its policy towards ensuring that the
economic system is not operated in such a manner as to permit the concentration
of wealth or the means of production and exchange in the hands of few
individuals or of a group”.
Again, section 15(5) of
the Constitution provides thus; “The Nigerian State shall abolish all corrupt
practices and abuse of power”.
In this instance of
privatization of Nigeria’s power plants, there are clear and present danger
that under the table dealings took place but sadly the anti-graft agencies that
ought to wage anti-corruption war are busy waging administrative lobby to
convince both the legislature and the executive arms of government to increase
the scope of financial resources to be paid to them to enable them survive. As
the late Musc Icon Fela would sing, "Dead body get accident, this is
double wahala for dead body and the owner of the dead body".
Nigeria is at a
crossroad and indeed Nigerians have found themselves between the deep blue sea
and the hard rock but the citizenry must not go to bed but must actively wage
advocacy battle to ensure that those diverting public fund to their private
accounts are brought to account for these huge crimes before the competent
court of law.
* Emmanuel Onwubiko is
head, HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS’ ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA; and blogs@www.huriwa.blogspot.com; www.huriwa.org.
17/10/2013
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