Senate declares power sector privatization a failure, threatens to reverse process

The Senate on Thursday described the privatization of the power sector as a failure.

The upper legislative chamber also threatened to initiate measures to reverse the process completed under former President Goodluck Jonathan in 2013.

This followed the adoption of the report of the Senate Committee on Power presented by its chairman, Eyinnaya Abaribe, at the plenary in Abuja.

They lamented that the electricity distribution companies (DisCoS) have largely failed to deliver reliable electricity to Nigerians in the last 11 years.

In his presentation, Abaribe said the country recorded huge financial losses each time the grid collapsed.

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On his part, the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, resident, Godswill Akpabio, questioned the efficiency of the privatization process.

He lamented that the DisCoS are unable to meet the demands of Nigerians despite the privatization.

In their resolutions, the senators expanded the scope of the investigation to include the probe of funds injected into the power sector in the last 20 years to determine their utilization, a review of the DisCoS performance, solutions to the frequent grid collapses, and another look at the laws that established privatization of the power sector.

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