Fashola: Power Privatisation Led to Staff Downsizing in Ministry from 15,000 to 1000
Urges NERC to prioritise regulation on consumer complaints
The Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola, has said that between 2013 when the federal government concluded its privatisation of Nigeria’s power sector and 2018, the ministry of power has reduced its staff strength from 15,000 to less than 1000.
He said since then, the job of the ministry has also moved from being an omnibus manager of the sector to just a policy maker, adding that the only electricity assets the government have a direct control over now were the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) and the Yola electricity distribution company (Disco) which was initially privatised but later returned to the government when its former core investors declared a force majeure on their operations.
Speaking recently in Abuja when he swore in the new executive chairman of NERC, Prof. James Momoh, the minister explained that since the privatisation was concluded, most staff of the ministry had either retired or left their jobs, thus resulting in a reduction of staff strength to 1000 from 15,000.
“I am one of the happiest people today and I will tell Nigerians why. Since privatisation took place, one of the things that have happened is that the size of the ministry of power shrank significantly.
“I think our staff strength before I came was in the region of 15,000 and all of that is now less than a thousand people because most of the staff, some retired as a consequence of the privatisation and transfer of ownership to the Gencos and the Discos,” said Fashola.
He then stated: “Today, unlike the old Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN), this ministry does not own any Gencos or Discos,” adding that, “the ministry only supervises the Yola Disco where privatisation became problematic and force majeure was declared.”
The minister also noted: “The truth is that we don’t buy meters and we don’t supply meters. Really and truly our role now is just to make policies; our quality of energy; type of energy; whether it is hydro, thermal, and solar or wind and to make sure that if there are problems we go and solve them. And, that is in terms of government activities.”
Fashola, reiterated the need for the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) to give priority attention to its regulation of service complaints filed against electricity distribution companies (Discos) consumers in Nigeria’s power market.
He explained that customer service satisfaction was still a challenge in the industry, and that it was the duty of NERC to educate consumers on the operations of the sector as well as their rights therein.