Data sourced by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) from the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trader (NBET) suggests that the nation’s power sector may not see the light of day soon, going by the level of debt owed generating company’s by their distribution counterparts.
According to a new report titled: “Nigerian Bulk Electricity Invoices and Payment from GENCOs to DISCOs and Offtakers (2016),” whereas the generating firms issued invoices amounting to N361.52bn to both DISCOs and the off-takers in the period, it only received a paltry N90.03bn or 24.9% as payment.
A breakdown of the figure showed that while the DISCOs were invoiced to the tune of N331.02bn, they only paid N88.03bn, representing 26.59%, leaving a balance N242.97bn as debt in the period under review.
Abuja DISCO was the biggest debtor with N31.923bn standing against it, out of the N44.992bn invoiced sum; ahead of the N29.0144bn by Ikeja, which was invoiced N42.44bn; and N28.394bn of N41.259bn for Ibadan. Enugu also ranked high with N27.041bn debt out of N30.365bn; Port Harcourt, N24.975bn; Kaduna, 23.484bn; and Benin, N22.862bn; while Yola DISCO emerges as the least indebted with N7.856bn.
Also, the bulk of the N88.029bn paid for power supplied during the period came from Eko, which made the highest payment of N13.464bn; followed by Ikeja, also in Lagos, with N13.396bn; Abuja, N13.069bn; and Ibadan, N12.865bn.
On a monthly basis, the highest payment of N10.49bn was made in January 2016; followed by N10.083bn in February.
The offtakers were worse, as they paid only N2bn or 6.62% share of the N30.2bn total invoice, leaving a balance of N27.39bn recorded at the end of 2016.
A further breakdown of the invoice showed that the highest- N41.726bn occurred in October, followed by previous month’s N39.456bn.
The Egbin Power Station had the highest invoice amount of N62.504bn, followed by N40.425bn for Delta and Okpai’s N37.774bn.
Other GENCOs on the list of creditors are: Afam, Afam vi (Shell); Alaoji NIPP, Asco, Calabar (Odukpani), Delta, Gbarain NIPP, Geregu, Geregu NIPP, Ibom Power, Ihovbor NIPP, Jebba, Kainji, Okpai, Olorunsogo 1 and Olorunsogo 2 (NIPP). Others include: Omotosho1 & 2, Rivers IPP, Sapele, Sapele2 (NIPP), Shiroro and Trans Amadi.
Also, the lion’s share of payments from the offtakers went to Egbin, which got N487.995m; Delta, N185.617m, Okpai, N176.329m and Afam vi (Shell), NN107.771m.
The bulk of the debt by the offtakers was owed to Egbin, N4.722bn; Delta, N3.236bn; and Okpai, N30.03bn.
Declaring open a two-day stakeholders’ interactive dialogue/workshop on the Nigerian power sector organized by the National Assembly, last Tuesday, Senate President Bukola Saraki, accused Nigeria’s past leaders of selfishness, for selling components of the then Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN), “based on cronyism rather than capital adequacy, market experience and capacity to deliver.
“We sold the discos to individuals and parties who had no idea about running a proper power distribution business.
He particularly took a swipe on the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) which he said “did things that were inexcusable.
“Not one single kobo of $4 billion from proceed of privatisation of power was expended towards catalyzing the sector back to life,” by the BPE, he lamented. To continue reading: https://investdata.com.ng/fg-sold-power-firms-inexperienced-cronies-saraki/
Also speaking at the event, Tony Elumelu, chairman of Transnational Corporation of Nigeria (Transcorp) said the current forex situation in Nigeria has led to huge exchange losses for power generating companies, following which Transcorp’s power subsidiary.
Transcorp, he lamented, suffered exchange rate losses of N22.5 billion, broken into N6 billion and N18.5 billion respectively in its 2015 and 2016 financial years respectively.
“These are huge losses to shareholders of Transcorp are bad for our economy,” he added, noting that such losses are reasons why “power generation companies are presently unable to meet critical capital and operational expenditure requirements as at date, following the default of the National Bulk Electricity Trader “to pay for electricity produced and sold to it by the power generating companies, all power generating companies are now in serious default of their loan service obligations thereby resulting in extreme pressures being exerted on them. This could have deleterious ripple effect on the system. To continue reading: https://investdata.com.ng/transcorp-plc-suffered-n24-5bn-forex-losses-2-years-elumelu/