Sell NNPC’s Shares To All Nigerians, Says NLC

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*Union Rejects TCN Privatisation

The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has canvassed that the Nigeria
National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) should be transformed into a
public liability company where every Nigerian can own shares.

NLC said the House of Representatives does not seem to
sufficiently capture this desire of the Nigerian people, describing
it as the major blight in the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB).

Speaking with The Nation, the NLC President, Comrade Ayuba Wabba
said NLC, as part of its input to the PlB during its appearance at
the public hearing, canvassed that the NNPC should be transformed
into a public liability company where every Nigerian can own
shares.

He said this desire to make the Nigerian people stakeholders in
the commonwealth of the country appears to have fared quite well in
the Senate’s consideration.

He said: ” We will like to draw the attention of the National
Assembly of the need to handle with utmost care the very sensitive
issue of the unbundling of the Nigeria National Petroleum
Corporation (NNPC).

“The bill as passed by the upper chamber of the National
Assembly retained the recommendation of the Joint Committee in
Clause 53 which empowers the Minister of Petroleum Resources to
incorporate the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation as a limited
liability company to be known as NNPC Limited.

“We are concerned that unlike the Senate representation of
Clause 53, Clause 53 of the PIB as passed by the House of
Representatives does not seem to sufficiently capture this desire
of the Nigerian people. This is a major blight in the PIB. It is
not good enough.

“We urges the National Assembly during its Conference to
harmonize the two versions of the passed bill pursuant to the
Senate’s representation of Clause 53 by effectively sanctioning the
transformation of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation into a
Public Liability Company.

“This would project the democratic appeal of the Petroleum
Industry Bill as a legal instrument that caters for the masses of
Nigeria.

“Poor and ordinary Nigerians who have endured the shorter end of
the stick under the old petroleum law deserve better.”

On the percentage of revenue proposed in the PIB as accruing to
oil producing communities, Wabba said it is important that the
conference committee of the National Assembly ensures equity in the
harmonisation of the three per cent proposed by the Senate and five
percent by the House of Representatives, especially in a manner
that gives a sense of justice, fairness and inclusion to oil
bearing and oil producing communities in the country.

He said this is because these communities bear the impact of
crude oil exploration and production.

Speaking further, Wabba said the Congress also observed the
non-inclusion of workers in the governing structures of the
proposed commercial and regulatory institutions and organisations
that would emerge from the unbundling of the NNPC.

Wabba , however, commended the Senate and the House of
Representatives for the passage, describing it as a good news.

“It is remarkable that after about twenty years of wait since
President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua first submitted the PIB to the
National Assembly, the PIB is finally becoming a reality. We
commend the Senate and the House of Representatives for rising to
the occasion.

“We know that the process of making the PIB a law has not been
completely consummated as the passed bill would still need to be
harmonised by a conference of the two chambers of the National
Assembly.

“President Muhammadu Buhari is also expected to sign the bill
into law. Definitely, there are a few more hurdles to cross,” Wabba
said.

On the planned sale of Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN),
Wabba warned against such move, describing it as behind-the-scene
manoeuvrings of the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) in the
process.

Wabba said this in a statement entitled: “This Kite will not
Fly”.

Wabba said the BPE had become synonymous with an unending
swindle of the people of Nigeria.

“The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has learnt with great
consternation a surreptitious plan to sell the Transmission Company
of Nigeria (TCN). Neither the congress nor the sectoral affiliate
union was officially contacted or even informally consulted on the
alleged plan.

“Therefore, Congress advises that if the report was planted and
so, designed to fly a kite, the paper kite is riddled with holes,
sodden, clumsy and torn in different places. In a word, this kite
cannot fly,” he added.

He pointed out that Nigerian workers and people were vehemently
opposed to this plot, warning that they would resist the grand
larceny.

Wabba said: “Congress condemns with vigour the continued
balkanisation, stripping and stealing of Nigeria’s economic assets.
The current attempt to hand over the Transmission Company of
Nigeria to a few ‘privileged’ Nigerians is self-serving, obtuse,
odious, morally reprehensible and criminal. Nigerian workers and
people are vehemently opposed to this plot and will resist this
grand larceny.”

According to him, the TCN is a strategic economic asset of
immense national security implications, because it traverses all
the nooks and crannies of Nigeria.

The NLC President warned that the planned sale of the TCN was
only an attempt to further confound the people and concurrently,
raise electricity tariff, warning that Nigerians have had
enough.

Wabba said: “We urge the Nigerian people to make no mistake
about the plot to sell TCN as it would only result in the
continuation of the regrettable policy of heaping an unbearable
burden on the ordinary people. The plan would also fundamentally
weaken the security of the nation and, above all, deprive the
people of their age-old investment in the commanding heights of the
Nigerian economy.

“In sum, Congress reiterates that it is faulty to contemplate
selling the TCN; it is an obvious misdirected and insupportable
policy. This clandestine plot is like the kite squeaking in the
dark with broken wings; it will simply not fly.