The House of Representatives at it plenary session of Tuesday 21st, November 2017 mandated its Committee on Power and Public Procurement to investigate an alleged fraudulent sale of Power Holding Company of Nigeria’s Core Assets and Scraps by the Nigeria Electricity Liability Management Company (NELMCO) and report back within a month. The came after statements on the floor of the House urged a prompt investigation of NELMCO over its impropriety during the auction of the redundant power company’s high value assets.

Presenting the motion on the floor of the House, Hon. Rita Orji (PDP: Lagos) stated that the auctioning of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria’s (PHCN) overtime cargoes, scraps and obsolete items worth over N20 Billion Naira was recently carried out by the Nigeria Electricity Liability Management Company (NELMCO) who claim to have realized about N1.5 Billion Naira from the sales.

Speaking further, Hon. Orji drew attention to claims that NELMCO had failed to conduct the auction transparently with irregularities and improper adverts on national dallies including the Traders Journal breaching legal requirements. Hon. Orji also raised the point that NELMCO did not give majority of the people who indicated an interest in PHCN’s core assets and scraps, the opportunity to buy them even after some had fulfilled all the necessary requirements for the purchases. The lawmaker also accused NELMCO for conducting a bidding process that was neither transparent nor forthright with allegations of its fraudulent activities trailing its auction process and now disputing its outcome. Lastly, she concluded by urging for a prompt investigation on the matter stating that a bad precedence would be set, if the outcry by the public against the seemingly spurious sale and auction was left unattended to.

The House has also mandated its Committee on Power and Public Procurement to monitor further sales of PHCN’s remaining overtime cargoes.