Group to FG: Don’t sell power assets

The Coalition of Northern Groups (CNG) has cautioned the National Council on Privatisation headed by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and the Bureau of Public Enterprise over plans to sell the Ihovba, Calabar, Geregu, Olorunsogo, and Omotosho power plants.

CNG in a statement issued in Abuja yesterday by Samaila Musa, its director of Strategic Communication, asserted that the sale of the power held by Niger Delta Power Holding Company Limited (NDPHC) will further diminish the economic viability of the northern region.

The statement reads in part: “The CNG insists that the power plants’ equity through NIPPs is owned by states and LGAs alongside the federal government which was designed and implemented in the South and eventually to be replicated in the North, as such, we reject in its totality any such plan to dispose of the plants without replicating same in the North as per the initial agreement.

“Also, we demand the northern versions of plants to be immediately established as agreed in 2004 when NIPPs was established and urge Northern federal lawmakers to stand firmly against this attempt at mortgaging the future of the North,” the CNG explained.