TUC Laments State of Nigerias Power, Petroleum Sectors Trade Union Congress of Nigeria, TUC, has said it is laughable and painful that Nigeria is still exporting crude and importing refined products after 54 years of independence and called on government to do everything possible to change the trend urgently. This came as the body said the decay in electricity generation and distribution in the country in spite of the $16 billion spent by the Obasanjos administration and other huge budgetary expenditures devoted to the sector since 1999, was quite appalling. In a statement by its President, Comrade Bobboi Kaigama, the umbrella body for senior staff associations in the country, said, The nations return to democratic rule in 1999 saw the government embarking on various infrastructural rehabilitation and development programmes. The power sector reforms happened to be one of such, but the myriad of challenges that characterised the sector are still with us even now. These challenges include inadequate generation and usage of power capacity, ineffective regulation, vandalism, inadequate transmission and distribution facilities, over-billing, etc. Presumably to improve on this unsavoury situation, the Federal Government announced an aggressive rehabilitation of power infrastructure. A major part of this drive is the National Integrated Power Project, NIPP, which is supposed to boost electricity generation capacity by the opening of gas power stations across the country. Other measures that are said to have been taken include the decentralisation and granting of licenses to separate Independent Power Producers, IPPs, the enactment of the Electric Power Sector Reform Act, EPSRA, 2005, etc. Despite all the reforms, however, we still generate less than 4000 Megawatts, a situation which has led to massive job losses due to closure of factories. This in itself has occasioned unimaginable high crime rate. And we still have both retired and disengaged power sector workers awaiting payment of their gratuities and pensions with no hope in sight. The decay in electricity generation and distribution in the country in spite of the $16 billion spent by the Obasanjo administration and other huge budgetary expenditures devoted to the sector since 1999 is quite appalling. On oil and gas, TUC said, It is mind-boggling that more than five decades after oil was discovered in the country, we are yet to fix the sector even though it is the mainstay of the economy, generating over 80% of our revenue. To think that we are still exporting crude and importing refined product after 54 years of independence is laughable and at the same time painful. The whole thing looks like a joke, and we wonder and ask: must our leaders joke with everything? Must they play politics with everything? It is out of their greed and avarice that the whole of the North-East has now become a shadow of itself. As a labour centre who has an affiliate in the oil and gas sector and well informed in the anomalies going on in the sector, the objectives of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) and Nigerias national interest are best secured under six broad themes. These are transparency and accountability; fiscal terms; institutional framework and regulator; refinery and other downstream activities; labour issues and membership of institutions, boards and committees and health, safety and environment. The PIB must in concrete terms provide for total transparency with regards to award of all contracts and Licenses, and other accompanying processes. These activities should closely follow the guidelines of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, EITI, and the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, NEITI. Another way to ensure transparency is to ensure mandatory publication of all licenses and contracts. The issues and position of labour is well spelt out and we insist that the PIB must address all of them as raised by the oil workers and Nigerians to avoid industrial action. Most assuredly, we insist that our refineries be made to work. Also, the issue of casualisation and gas flaring should also be seriously looked into. TUC equally took exception to the rising wave of unfair labour practices, declaring that the increasing practice of casualisation and anti-union practices by employers of labour is seriously alarming. Curiously, indigenous employers are as guilty of this, as are the multinationals. One thing is sure: we shall fight all such employers until we see that all workers are unionised and their interests protected. We implore the Ministry of Labour and Productivity to work with us to ensure that Nigerians are not engaged today and dismissed tomorrow.
Posted on: Thu, 09 Oct 2014 09:13:59 +0000
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