By Musa Adamu
Abuja
Minister of power, works and housing, Babatunde Fashola, has denied a lead story of one the national daillies (not Blueprint) quoting him as saying that the nation’s power sector was illegally sold.
The national daily had reported the minister made statement at the Senate public hearing on electricity tariff where he was alleged to have told the Committee that as a Minister he inherited a power sector “where government’s interests have been illegally sold.”
In a statement by his Special Adviser on Media, Hakeem Bello, however, distanced the Minister from the alleged pronouncement saying in all presentations before the Senate Committee, the Minister never used the word “illegally” to refer to the privatization of the sector by the federal government.
Insisting that the medium got the statement of the minister wrong, the minister aide the right statement by the minster was: ” …As Minister, I inherited a Power Sector where government interests had been LEGALLY sold…”
Bello clarified that the minister, in tracing how the country got to this point, referred to the privatization Act made in 2005, saying: “The people of this country through their parliamentarians made a verdict in 2005 when you passed that law that things must change, the law was passed in 2005 and the process was completed in 2013, I wasn’t here, some of you were here, if the process is bad where was the oversight.”
He further explained the minister told the Senate that:
“I will commend to this Committee the Report of the House of Representatives that investigated the matter. I will also commend to you Sirs, some of the Reports that have been made by the Senate Committee on Privatization. The basic reason for the passage of the Power Sector Reforms Bill that was passed in 2005 is that we all know that the government was not doing its business well.
“These decisions were taken before any of us was here. If it was working why change it, who were the people that were employed to make it work, it was our employers in the TUC and other unions, and if they complain that the dam was not working and the power plant was not working, that was why they were hired.”
He said to buttress the minster’s attitude towards the leagity of the sector, he recalled that the minister had reminded the Senate Committee that the privatisation exercise would be three years old in November this year, citing the example of the Communication Sector that was privatised over ten years ago which benefits were still evolving.
