Jide Ajani
16 May 2008
opinion
In what appears to be full on grandstanding and empty on altruism, the famed power sector probe, while opening the eyes of Nigerians to the dangers inherent in the collapse of the energy sector as made manifest by the dismally low level of power generation in Nigeria, may actually be a distraction of sorts, even making the energy situation in Nigeria worse than it should be. This report merely asks the critical question: After weeks of grandstanding, how many power sector thieves have been caught and where; but most importantly, has the probe improved the power situation in the country?
Even Caligula couldn't have been so despised.
But because Nigeria is a polity of clashing interests, where individuals and institutions take flights of fancy, the probe into what went down in the power sector promised so much for Nigerians. More so at a time when Nigerians were groaning under the burden of heavy darkness, whoever was responsible deserved to be lynched.
However, after weeks of showmanship by the Ndudi Godwin Elumelu Committee, what has been the benefit of Nigerians regarding the availability of electricity?
Obasanjo
For starters, Elumelu was one of the staunchest supporters of Speaker Patricia Olubunmi Etteh, during the misappro-priation, mis-application and contract scandal. How he transmuted from an Etteh supporter to become a champion of altruistic legislative engagement should get some commendation from the Nigerian public.
But the truth remains: To what extent has the activities of his committee contributed to the generation, transmission and distribution of electricity.
To be fair, the job needed to be done: That is, looking into the expenditure pattern in that sector.
But in doing that, it should be with a view to providing for the masses and not playing to the gallery. And in any case, had the House of Representative members who were grandstanding on the matter performed their true oversight functions when the project was being carried out, Nigerians would have been properly guided.
And as is discernible from excerpts from the responses of Olusegun Obasanjo, former president, Atiku Abubakar, former vice president, and Nenadi Usman, former finance minister, errors may have occurred but not in the manner the House Committee attempted to pull wool.
Excerpts from Obasanjo's response to the House Committee, reads:
"May I draw your attention to the letter of 3rd of May received on the 9th of May headed 'Invitation to Appear at the Public Hearing on the Power Sector'. I observed that the letter was not authored or signed by the Chairman of the Committee, Hon. Ndudi Godwin Elumelu.
Atiku Abubakar
"The signature is that of one Sahmed. As a matter of comment, I believe that courtesy and decency will suggest that a letter from any Chamber of the National Assembly to me as former President of this country, on a matter of this nature, will be signed by the head of the chamber concerned on behalf of the Committee or the Clerk of the National Assembly or, at the minimum, the Chairman of the Committee itself and not by a third party. For the reason of the way and manner your invitation came as well, I may choose not to appear and merely object to the manner of invitation. Again, I have chosen not to go that way.
"As Africans, we must respect age and authority. It is also a product of birth and breeding in an African culture. I hope members of the Committee will have something to learn from this exercise.
Be that as it may, let me go to the points that will "give an insight and perspective into what" I know and my role in the execution of projects from 1999 to 2007.
'We have to coordinate and harmonise five aspects of the building of generation and evacuation unit in each site - turbine, gas provision, civil works, electrical station and transmission or evacuation. Unless all these are synchronised and brought together, expenditure on four, leaving out one as uncompleted, will still leave out power generation let alone having the power at our homes and factories. No matter what resources you may have, it will take a minimum of three years, if there are no interruptions or disruptions and with hard driving, to complete any one of these units.
Without hard driving and with any disruption, it may take up to five years or more.
If South Africa, with a population less than one-third of Nigerian population, has a power generation of some 40,000MW and yet still only an industrialising country, Nigeria will need close to 100,000MW of power generating capacity to become a serious industrialising country.
But with the existing power generation capacity, the four thermal units earlier embarked upon and the seven NIPP, if pursued vigorously, Nigeria was to have 10,000MW generating capacity by 2007/2008 and then move by leaps and bounds to some 20,000MW by 2015. That programme is feasibly put in the pipeline but it has to be driven to be achieved.
As a people who are desirous of making rapid economic and social progress, we have no alternative. Talking of any alternative can only be an idle talk or borne out of ignorance."
Atiku Abubakar
On what he knew about the power projects, Atiku told the committee that, "The policy of the Federal Government' Emergency Power Projects in the year 2004 was informed by the need to take emergency steps to improve the power situation in Nigeria.
"It was generally accepted by the three tiers of government at that time that the country faced a crisis situation of power supply. Against this background, the Federal Executive Council approved the setting up of two Committees to address the problem: (i) The Steering Committee on Emergency Power Projects chaired by the then Minister of Power, Liyel Imoke and; (ii) The Implementation Committee made up of one representative governor from each of the six geo-political zones, chaired by the then Vice President, Atiku Abubakar.
"In that committee, there were also governors representing each of the states in which the projects were located. In addition, there was one governor from each state in which there was similar or associated project.
"In view of the scope and resources involved, it required close monitoring and that was how I perceived my role when I was made chairman," he said.
He said: "When the President on his own made me the chairman of the Implementation Committee, it was certainly in recognition of the fact that it was an important national project. The project was massive, the cost was enormous and the logistics were horrendous. As a matter of fact, we agreed with the President in the National Economic Council that the electricity supply situation in the country was dismal and that an urgent intervention was necessary."
Nenadi Usman
Usman clarified her stand on the waiving of the Due Process Certificates for payment. She said: "Yes, I do recall that indeed there was a waiver. There are two issues on Due Process on the award and the payments.
"The Due Process that was waived was for payment. Imoke in his haste to see that something was done to the power situation wrote to former president, Olusegun Obasanjo. In a bid to hasten up the process, he did write a letter making requests for Due Process to be waived in the payment. He actually wrote and you people should have a copy of the letter.
"As a Minister you don't pay contractors, you process the papers and the CBN does the payment. As a minister I was not competent to pay any contractor.
"As a minister, I usually try to watch out for the Invoice, the Contract Agreement and the DPC that was used in the award of the contract and the DPC. And in this case, the President waived the DP, based on the letter that was written. I also had copies of the Due Process Waiver so it was not a matter of the ministers waiving Due Process, but the instructions.
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