There is, therefore, no doubt that many Nigerians would be willing to give an arm and a leg, figuratively speaking, to have regular electricity in the country.
Nigerian presidents, over the years, have not been unaware of the power debacle. The Nigerian landscape is littered with failed promises of many governments on power supply. It is, indeed, one sector in which government’s promises and kites have been so easily deflated. Ask former president, Olusegun Obasanjo. All his vows on the sector came to naught. Power is the sector that almost demystified Obasanjo’s Power Minister, the late Chief Bola Ige, who was hurriedly moved from the ministry to the Ministry of Justice, from where he was assassinated.
Ask President Goodluck Jonathan. All his vows, as Vice President, last year, that Nigerians would have no need for generators by this year, on account of the federal government’s planned resuscitation of the power sector, fell like a pack of cards, before his own eyes.
Since he assumed full leadership of the country, however, President Jonathan has left no one in doubt that he is bent on revamping the sector. He has come up with a roadmap for power. A national Super Grid is to be constructed to boost electricity supply. The 11 distribution units of the national power carrier, Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN), are to be privatised, to make them more efficient in order to boost power supply.
All these are welcome steps, but, the latest initiative from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to invest N400 billion of pensioners and workers’ money from the National Pension Fund in the power sector calls for a No No.
Money in the Pension Funds is no free money. It is money that belongs to retirees who have spent their lives working for the nation, who deserve rest and peace of mind in their old age. It is also money that belongs to workers who are working hard now with the expectation that they will receive their pensions when they retire.
Should money belonging to these two categories of Nigerians be pumped into a bottomless pit that has gulped trillions of naira in the past decade, with little to show it?
I think not, and Nigerians, including the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) should not look askance and let this great evil be perpetrated on workers and retirees’ money.
The Central Bank needs to be told, in strong terms, and possibly, sued; to ensure that pension funds are not trifled with. There is no doubt that government has a history of profligacy in the power sector. Investigations into how trillions of naira in the sector was managed, in the past, did not reach a logical denouement.
Instead, some of the legislators who were charged with the investigation fell into the same bottomless pit of corruption. Money pumped into the sector has become some form of national cake, with all those charged with its management, struggling to have a share of it.
Although CBN governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, was quoted by Bloomberg to have said, at a conference in London, that the apex bank would provide guarantees to allow the release of the money to viable and eligible power projects, it is not assuring enough, because if the Federal government had been alive to its responsibility of paying retirees pensions as due, the idea of the National Pension Fund under the Pension reforms might not have arisen, in the first place
In addition, the governor has not said how, with Nigeria’s peculiar experience in these matters, pension funds invested in power projects will translate into cash that will be paid back to the National Pension Fund, when retirees need their savings.
Also, the Federal Government has never demonstrated seriousness in bringing those who toy with power sector funds to book. It is quite instructive that on the same day the plan to invest pension funds in power projects became public knowledge, Nigerians received the news that the Federal Government has dropped all charges against the sacked chairman and six commissioners of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) who had been answering charges related to corruption in the court.
The decision to drop the suit no FG/HC/CR/34/09 Federal Republic of Nigeria versus Owan and six others was ostensibly taken to woo the former officials to drop court cases challenging their removal from office, in order to pave way for the reconstitution of a new board in order to move the power sector forward. The suit is to be withdrawn through entering of a nolle prosecui by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) on the next adjourned date.
Does this suggest a serious approach to fighting corruption in the power sector? And, are pension funds safe in such a sector where government would so lightly withdraw a suit it filed against persons accused of corruption?
This is the question the NLC, retirees’ organisations and pension fund administrators, should be asking the government.
The matter of our pension laws is another area that needs to be looked at. The general belief is that it is pension fund administrators that are empowered to administer and invest pension funds. How does the CBN come into the matter? NLC should look into this.
If pensioners’ funds must be invested in the power sector, Federal Government guarantees on the N400 billion the CBN wants to unlock from pension funds into the sector, will not be enough.
Firm bank guarantees from banks with the required strength are required.
Moreover, the legal underpinnings of the CBN plan should be studied and addressed to ensure that the regulatory body has not stepped outside its bounds as a regulator of banks in Nigeria.
There is no doubt that pumping in money could help to solve the power problem if such money is judiciously used, but this should not be at the expense of workers and retirees.
If pensions funds must be pumped into the power sector, it should be done through dialogue and consensus of all stakeholders, not via CBN fiat.
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