The Federal Government has secured additional $350m (N54.5bn) for the Nigerian Electricity Bulk Trading Plc in a bid to boost the organisation’s power purchase abilities.
According to the government, the fund is in addition to the allocation for the bulk trader in the 2014 budget.
The Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, disclosed this on Thursday at the headquarters of the NBET in Abuja prior to a meeting with the board members.
She said, “Essentially, we are here for a regular board meeting where we consider very serious issues. As you know, the bulk trader has just been very well reformed to be able to carry out its intermediary market role in the power sector.
“The bulk trader, in addition to the resources that it has from the budget, has also received $350m as a liquidity facility, which is being managed for it by the Sovereign Wealth Fund. The $350m is fresh from the Eurobond and we gave it to the sovereign fund to manage.”
Explaining why the board members were meeting on Thursday, Okonjo-Iweala said, “We want to catch up on the activities of the bulk trader and we are delighted because the bulk trader has also been working on a very interesting Greenfield project, the Azura Power.
“It has been putting in place innovative ways to be able to improve the power sector in the country and we will talk about that in our meeting.”
On why the Nigeria Investment Sovereign Authority was asked to manage the funds of the bulk trader, the minister said it was for the purpose of generating returns to offset the interest on the loan.
She said, “You recall that most of the Eurobond was taken to support the power sector.
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