Tuesday, September 20, 2016
The
sale of Nigerian Coal Corporation (NCC), Enugu, by the Bureau for Public
Enterprise (BPE) for the sum of N160 million, has come under scrutiny. Hundreds
of angry villagers from Enugu communities gathered at the premises of the
corporation recently with placards, protesting what they termed the frittering
away of assets of the corporation and urging President Muhammadu Buhari to
revoke the sale.
Petition
demanding a thorough investigation of the said transaction was reviewed
recently by the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption, chaired by
Prof Itse Sagay, and forwarded to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission
(EFCC) for necessary action. Indeed, a human rights group, Socio-Economic
Rights Initiative (SERI), led by the Chief Executive Officer, Raymond Onyegu,
had, in a petition to the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption,
demanded the cancellation of the purported sale. The group noted that underthe
sale of non-core assets of the Corporation, the BPE transferred the entire core
and non-core assets of the corporation for a paltry sum of N160 million. The
land, according to the group, covers an entire area of 55.99 hectares or 996
plots of land in the state capital.
"Therefore,
the land was sold at N150, 000 per plot in an area where the going price for
land is N10 million per plot. Besides, the claim of sale of non-core asset is
misleading because what was sold was 56 hectares, which included all the core
assets of the corporation," the group alleged.
The
Socio-Economic Rights Initiative, which has an observer status at the African
Commission on Human and Peoples Rights and also collaborates with the United
Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, alleged that the
sale of the corporation was bereft of due process and openness as required by
the law, establishing the Bureau for Public Enterprises.
In
an interview with Daily Sun, Onyegu alleged that the buyer of the property, Mr.
Eric Chime was producing table water, instead of investing in coal mining. He also
accused the investor of massive cannibalisation and asset stripping of the
property of the corporation.
Onyegu
said the consent of the Minister of Solid Minerals Development was not
obtained, prior to the transaction, as required by Section 12 (4) of the
Nigerian Coal Corporation Act, 1950, Cap 299, Laws of the Federation of
Nigeria, 1990.
A
former staff of Nigerian Railway Corporation, ChiefReuben Ozonnadi, regretted
that the corporation and its mines had been turned to a table water company. He
said the facility had coal washing plant; the largest in Asia and African
continents, which was installed by former President, Olusegun Obasanjo, to
revive the sector. He claimed that thecoal washing plant had been vandalised.
"This
area is a core asset of the Nigerian Coal Corporation. Government never
advertised for the sale of core assets. The mines are still there. Nobody sold
the mines. We have mines in the northern part of the country. This is the first
mining site in Enugu. Westill have coal reserves in this area. I worked here as
head of department. I championed the research on coal brickate, which was
launched in the year 2000."
He
said coal could still be mined in Enugu if government takes the required step
to revive the sector. Aside from the coal reserve, he explained that the area
had huge deposits of refractory crates, the only place where such treasure
could be found in the entire southeast.
Ozonnadi,
an engineer by profession, said he joined the Nigerian Coal Corporation in 1975
and worked till 2015.
"Nobody
is happy with what is going on. Go to the northern part of the country and you
will see that all the property and assets of Nigerian Coal Corporation are
still intact. Why should they sell the one in Enugu? It is only in the eastern
part that people are vandalising the property of NCC," he explained.
Ozonnadi
urged Nigerian government to borrow a leaf from South Africa, China and India
that had maintained profitable coal mining industry. He expressed
disappointment that such an important sector, which could have been an economic
lifeline, was jettisoned and auctioned off at a ridiculous price. He said coal
could be used to generate power at reduced cost. The Oji River Power Station,
he said, had been vandalised, while the Ijora Power Station that was fired by
coal has also been abandoned.
The
Chairman of Enugu-Ngwo community, Sir Chris Ejike Agu, told Daily Sun that the
landed property of the corporation belonged to Enugu Ngwo people, an
inheritance from their forefathers. He said the community entered into an
agreement with the colonialists on rental basisfor the establishment of the
coal corporation.
"It
wasn't an outright sale. My people knew that it was a taboo for anybody to sell
land. An Ngwo man regards it as a sacrilege to sell a land he inherited from
his forefathers," he explained.
Agu
said government could exercise the right to take land in the overriding interest
of the public, but argued that such land must not be acquired and transferred
to an individual.
He
said during the olden days, there was a rope linefrom the Bunker to Okpara
mine, which transported coal safely without any interruption. The coal would
later be loaded onto the train coaches and transported through the rail to
Kano, Kaduna or Lagos.
"If
you go up to that point, they have started excavating the rail line. When we
talk of asset stripping, the rope line has been vandalised and carted away.
This impunity must stop. So far, the transaction is illegal in the sense that
what was sold was non-core assets. How can you sell land by auction?" he
wondered.
He
said it wasn't realistic that 996 plots of land, from hill to hill, could be
sold, as such could mean selling off an entire community. He alleged that the
purported buyer demolished 27 buildings where several families lived.
"Sadly," he said: "Teams of policemen were at the scene of the
demolition to supervise the exercise."
Agu
insisted that the claim by the state government that the demolished structures
could collapse was barefaced lies because the area never experienced any
building collapse. He urged the Federal Government to cancel the sale of the
property and bring all those involved in the transaction to book.
"They
should pay adequate compensation to those that they demolished their houses.
How can they be deceiving people and the entire country? How can the government
promise to revive the coal industry and the Oji power station, but turn back to
sell off the Nigeria Coal Corporation?"
Further
investigation revealed that former President Goodluck Jonathan raised the hope
of resolving the prolonged crisis in the power sector when his administration
signed $3.7 billion Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with a Chinese firm on
coal energy. The MoU was a defining moment for most Nigerians, with the promise
that the coal-to-power project would generate additional 1200 megawatts of
electricity to the national grid.
The
project was designed to run in two phases – the development of the coal mine
and the construction of the power plant. Sadly, the end of Jonathan's
administration nailed this dream, while the auctioning off of the assets of the
Corporation seemed to have snuffed out the additional 1200 megawatts to the
national grid.
When
Daily Sun contacted Mr. Chime, he denied any wrongdoing, noting that government
took the decisive step to privatise the property due to the vandalisation of
the assets by self-seeking individuals in the community.
"What
is their interest? Are they protecting the government or do they have any stake
in the property? The government had to sell the property of the corporation
because people were vandalising them. The government had no option but to
privatise it and sell it off," he said.
Chime
explained that he never bought the coal mine, but rather the analogue and
moribund coal washing plant, which cannot be used in the modern technology for
coal processing. According to him, he followed due process in the buying of the
property.
"We
bidded and I won. I was not the only one that bidded for the property. I paid
for the property. I have established six industries in the place. We are
employing almost 1, 000 people. This transaction was done four years ago. We
have done a lot of work in the place. These peopleare the same group that went
and even vandalised my property there," he said.
Chime
said some land grabbers were collecting money from some individuals and selling
portions of the land to them to build residential houses, despite government's
explanation that the area was prone to land slide and unfit for habitation.
On
the claim that he had encroached onto the core assets of the corporation, as
against the non-core assets spelt out in the initial agreement, he said:
"If the government didn't sell the asset to me, they would have called me
to order. But the government assigned all those property to me and gave me the
certificate of occupancy. These protesting groups are the ones that want the
government to lose its property. Those people are claiming that they are Enugu
Ngwo people, who own the land and not the government. They collect money from
people and allocate them portions of land to build residential houses."
Chime
said he had the right to use the property as he desired. According to him, as
an industrialist, he decided to establish industries in the area to create more
employment opportunities for people.He said the Enugu State Governor, Ifeanyi
Ugwuanyi, visited the area last month to encourage the industrial development
of the area.
"My
own is just part of what the Coal Corporation is selling. The hospital there
was sold; their head office was sold. More is being sold even now, including
houses that Coal Corporation people were using. Even the one at the Express,
the state government bought it from the Federal Government and they are mapping
the place out now," he added.
A
chieftain in the area, Chief Friday Ani, who is also the Chairman of Ngenevu
Landlords Association, saidthe purportedsale of the property brought distress
on Ngenevu and Bunker communities in the area. According to him, members of
thecommunity were shocked when bulldozers moved into the area and started
demolishing people's houses.
"We
tried to stop them but they said they were sent by the government. After the
demolition, we went to complain to the state government that members of the
community were losing their homes and 21 of us were arrested and unlawfully
detained for 14 days by the police. Even the serving Councillor then in Ngenevu
was equally detained," he said.
Ani
said the clampdown on poor communities was uncalled for, as he urged the
relevant authorities to revisit the matter and revoke the sale of the Nigerian
Coal Corporation.
Further
investigation revealed that Enugu, the Coal City, still had an estimated coal
reserve of two billion metric tonnes, yet, the Nigerian Coal Corporation went
moribund in 1999 when it lost its monopoly over the nation's coal industry.
Experts argue that the privatisation of the corporation and its assets was like
killing the goose that lays the golden egg. The initial plan by the FG to sell
off 40 per cent to private investors, 20 per cent to the Nigerian public, and
retain 40 per cent, never yielded the desired result.
In
2002, work stopped at the NCC operated mines. Not even the technical advisory
committee set up in 2003 could revive the ailing coal industry.
SOURCE: THE SUN