Electricity distribution companies in the country say they have offered to return their licences to the federal government on two different occasions.
Sunday Oduntan, executive director of research and advocacy of the Association of Nigerian Electricity Distributors (ANED), was reacting to a statement credited to Saleh Mamman, minister of power, that DisCos should either show they have enough capacity to distribute electricity or step aside for other investors.
Oduntan told ARISE TV in an interview on Monday that the federal government refused the offer on both occasions. ANED is the umbrella body of the DisCos.
“We believe that as long as the government or regulator do the right thing that is consistent with the wordings and tenets of the agreement signed with the private investors, they are free to take any action as long as the rule of law is observed,” he said.
“As far as we are concerned, we have taken our licences to them, before two times, one during the tenure of Jonathan. We said thank you for selling to us, take we are no more interested. It is called force majeure in law. Give us our money back. They said no; we are not taking it from you. They gave it back to us that we should keep on running it.
“During Buhari’s time, we said we are no more interested. They said no. For us to have filed force majeure tells you we are not a desperate set of people. All their concern is to be able to recover their costs. What we all want is electricity.”
There have been calls from various quarters for the federal government to review the privatisation process that held in 2013 resulting in the unbundling of the power sector.