Buhari probes NITEL privatisation

President Muhammadu Buhari has ordered an investigation into the privatisation of the Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL) and its mobile arm, the Mobile Telecommunications (Mtel).

The president gave the directive at the Presidential Villa in Abuja yesterday after the permanent secretary of the Ministry of Communications Technology, Tunji Olaopa, briefed him about the activities of the ministry.

The National Council on Privatisation (NCP) had, on April 28, 2015 during the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan, handed over NITEL and Mtel assets to NATCOM Consortium upon full payment of the purchase consideration of $252,221,000 ahead of April 2015 deadline.

The NCP, headed by former Vice President Mohammad Namadi Sambo, had declared NATCOM Consortium the preferred bidder for NITEL and MTEL assets sequel to the disqualification of NETTAG Consortium as a result of its failure to submit a bid bond with its technical proposal.

But the permanent secretary of the ministry told State House correspondents yesterday that Buhari was concerned about the entire privatisation hampering investment in the information and communications technology.

The permanent secretary further noted that President Buhari specifically expressed concern about the liquidation of NITEL.

According to Olaopa, while the president is not opposed to the NITEL privatisation, he has directed the ministry to come up with a memo on how the transaction was undertaken to know whether Nigeria was shortchanged in the privatization exercise. 

In a statement later issued yesterday by the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Malam Garba Shehu, Buhari directed the ministry to work harder to fully develop the revenue-generation potential of Nigeria’s information technology sector. 

The president also directed the ministry to bring forward for his consideration and approval, all pending proposals for the development of the country’s IT sector which require the approval of the Federal Executive Council.

The statement said Buhari also asked for a comprehensive report on the sale of the Nigerian Telecommunications Company (NITEL) as he was concerned by the continuing protests of former NITEL employees and other Nigerians over the manner in which assets of the company were sold.

Source:dailytrust