Six foreign firms qualify to bid for NAFCON
From Pascal Nwigwe, Abuja
E IGHT foreign companies have expressed interest as core investors in the National Fertiliser Company of Nigeria (NAFCON) which is slated for privatisation.
Of this number, six have already been pre-qualified by the Bureau for Public Enterprises (BPE).
Director-General of the BPE, Dr. Julius Bala, disclosed this at the National Assembly, Abuja, yesterday when he met with the House of Representatives Committee on Industries.
On the eight Chinese, Russian and European core operators that have expressed interest in NAFCON, he said: "These are formidable investors and we have pre-qualified six of them. In a few weeks, they will undertake due diligence."
Bala, who confirmed a debt of N9.6 billion by NAFCON to its workers, attributed the inability of the BPE to hasten the sale of the company to the failure of the Rivers State government to issue title deeds for the corporation.
Answering questions posed by the chairman of the committee, Uche Maduako, Bala disclosed that a meeting was convened eight months ago with President Olusegun Obasanjo and Rivers State Governor, Peter Odili, for the purpose of extracting a pledge from the latter for an expedited action on the issuance of a Certificate of Occupancy (C of O) for NAFCON.
At the meeting convened to enable disengaged workers of the fertiliser corporation explain their position before the Minister for Industries, Alhaji Mogaji Mohammed, the House and the BPE, Bala also disclosed that the payment of N9.6 billion owed workers was consequent on the sale of the company in October this year.
"The proceeds from the privatisation will be used to address workers' benefits. It is what we did with other cases before taking the proceeds to the privatisation account. The case of NAFCON will not be different," he said.
Reporting that a huge debt profile had constituted a problem in selling the corporation, Bello put the amount claimed by NAFCON's creditors at N8.6 billion.
He added, however, said that some of the claims were bogus.
"The BPE and the National Council on Privatisation have set up a panel to verify these claims," he said.
He added that N3 billion of the trade debts had so far been discounted.
Taking presentations from the management of NAFCON, the minister and representatives of the 1,300 disengaged workers, Maduako condemned hinging the payment of severance benefits and pensions on the sale of NAFCON.
Among the workers' demands was the immediate payment of N1.1 billion, which they contributed jointly with management for their pensions as part of the National Provident Fund.
The workers said the money did belong to NAFCON and thus unconnected with its sale.
A memorandum of understanding had earlier been signed between the ministry and the disengaged workers with the hope that the privatisation of NAFCON would have been concluded by March 2004.
