BPE names management team for disco taken over by UBA
The Bureau of Public Enterprises on Thursday named members of the interim management team for the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company which was taken over recently by the United Bank for Africa.
It outlined the interim management team to include Bada Akinwumi as Managing Director; Sani Usman, Chief Business Officer; Babajide Ibironke, Chief Finance Officer; Donald Etim, Chief Marketing Officer and Femi Zachaeus, Chief Technical Officer.
It said in a statement issued in Abuja that the Nigerian Electricity Regulation Commission had already approved the appointment of the interim management team for the power company.
In approving the appointment of the new interim management for the AEDC, the BPE quoted the Chairman, NERC, Sanusi Garba, as saying that “It (the approval) is pursuant to the earlier fit and proper review of your (BPE’s) pool of nominees and in the context of business continuity framework of the Nigerian Electricity Supply Industry”.
The NERC and the BPE had sacked the former management team of the AEDC and approved the appointment of an interim team to manage the power distribution company on the basis of legal processes arising from the failure of the core investor to meet its obligations to a lender (UBA).
Both agencies explained that there had been an ongoing dispute among competing factions of the AEDC’s majority shareholder/core investor known as KANN Utility Company Limited.
The United Bank for Africa had acted as mandated lead arranger, underwriting the entire facility of $122m, about N20bn then for Kann Utilities acquisition of the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company.
The provision of Electricity Supply in AEDC’s network area was only restored after the intervention of the Minister of Power, NERC and BPE following an agreement with the union on the terms for the suspension of the industrial action.
