FG spends N609bn to settle labour liabilities

Director General of the Bureau of Public Enterprises, Mr. Benjamin Dikki, has revealed that the Federal Government spent about N609,398,074,485.63 between 2000 and 2013 in settlement of labour liabilities in privatised public enterprises.

Speaking during an interactive session with newsmen, in Abuja, after a meeting with the Energy Working Group of the Nigeria-Germany Bi-National Commission, Dikki noted that sectoral break-down shows that a chunk of the money was spent in the settlement of labour liabilities in the power sector, which gulped over N384.062 billion so far, representing 63 per cent of the N609 billion payout.

Power sector, he said, was closely followed by the telecommunications sector, and principally, the settlement of labour issues in NITEL/M-TEL, with a total sectoral spend of N126, 716,111,589.00

According to him, the Federal Government had further spent N67, 780,039,618.52 in the settlement of labour liabilities in the transport and aviation sector with bulk of it used for settlement of liabilities of the workers of Nigeria Ports Authority (NPA).

The steel sector consumed another N10, 733,347,712.53 while the government spent about N8, 950,510,491.00 in the settlement of labour issues in privatised enterprises in the agro-allied sector.

Others beneficiaries of this huge public sector expenditure include: Insurance N4,700,000,000.00; Sugar companies N3,527,095,184.00; Paper mills N417,447,000.00; Hospitality N1,262,708,633.60; and Cement companies with N636,324,705.00; On the other hand, media enterprises N505,874,001.23; and petrochemicals N106,615,529.87.

On the labour issues in PHCN successor companies, he said government had shown tremendous goodwill and commitment to resolving all the labour issues in the power transaction, adding that it was the only singular transaction that all the proceeds realised from the sale of power assets were committed to settling labour liabilities.

“Payment of all the workers entitlements is on-going and money set aside to pay all those that have been duly cleared”, he added.

The Federal Government has demonstrated great commitment in resolving labour issues in the power sector reform and privatization. Apart from committing the entire proceeds realized from the sale of power assets to the payment of the workers’ terminal benefits, government had at the initial stage of the transaction, released N57 billion to take care of the workers pension.

This came after the government had increased the workers’ salary by 50 per cent and regularized some of the casual workers.