The Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai and the Ad-hoc committee on the review of the ownership structure have gotten the two-months extension for the report on the Electricity Power Distribution Companies by the National Economic Council (NEC).
Newsmen gathered from the Deputy Governor of Edo State, Philip Shaibu, during a briefing on Thursday shortly after NEC meeting which was chaired by the Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, that the extension request was granted to due to the need for the state government to carry out forensic audit of all bank accounts of electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos) in the country.
The governor said that the extension may also enable state governments to provide details of their investments in DisCos.
He said;
“One of those issues was the issue of forensic and to ascertain the level of investment by DisCos. You all know that the issue of privatization is still questionable. But nonetheless, the federal government and governors feel we should not lament; what we should do is to look for a solution.
“If government laments, the populace will definitely lose hope. So, they need the additional two months so that when they are reporting to the council, it will be wholistic; so that one council decision will be made to deal with the issue of the DisCos.”
“Of course, nobody is happy with the DisCos performance and we have a committee chaired by the governor of Kaduna state and they have done a very beautiful job. “They have placed advertisements in about five newspapers and have asked the general public to give them information on the performance of these DisCos and also investments made by private individuals and private sectors.
“And also, the governors are requested before the end of March to also submit all their investments from 2013 to date, so that we will get it all together as we were directed by the electricity authority to stamp our claims.
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“I think the federal government is trying to take the bull by the horn by trying to find out what investments these DisCos made towards this privatization. The first suspicion is that they have made no substantial investment and we will take it, when we get all the solutions.”