Government Appoints Liquidator For Nitel; Begins Process Of Partial Privatization Of Bank Of Industry And Bank Of Agriculture

At last the Nigerian Government has appointed a liquidator to oversee the folding up and subsequent sale of its defunct National telecommunications carrier NITEL

Previous attempts to sell the Telecommunications outfit have over the years been unsuccessful leading to the operations of the company to pack up completely

This appointment of the liquidator was part of decisions reached at a meeting of the National Council on Privatization on Thursday at State House, Abuja.

There has been a flurry of meetings this year of the National Council on Privatisation, this being the fifth, in pursuit of Government's resolve to divest itself of the responsibiltiy  public companies and at the same time fix some of the past failures as the NITEL case exemplifies.

Not for the first time, government proceeded down the path of selling NITEL/MTEL by appointing a liquidator to carry out the process.

But this time around the Council aims at achieving a controlled liquidation of the establishment by ensuring it is sold as a going concern.

Another process concluded was the next stage in the process of privatizing the Afam Power Plant and The kaduna Distribution Company with the emergence of preferred bidders for the companies

The council also began discussions on the partial privatization of the Bank of Industry and the Bank of Agriculture in the belief that the sale of shares in these Government Banks would facilitate their access to funds from national and international financial institutions.

New on the plate of the Council at this meeting was the process of privatization of National parks and National stadia nationwide.