The federal government yesterday hinted that it had approved a new monthly wage bill of N11bn for employees of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN).
The new wage bill is said to be coming on the heels of an earlier approval of 50 per cent increase in the salary structure of the PHCN staff.
Vice -President Namadi Sambo, who stated this while declaring open a two-day Power Sector Reform workshop at the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa, Abuja, said N57bn was expended by the federal government on the payment of monetised benefits to all the PHCN employees, adding that about 99 per cent of the staff, both serving and retired, had received their monetised benefits already.
He said, “As a further demonstration of our interest in the welfare of electricity workers, we are also favourably considering the recommendation for a 50 per cent increase in the salary structure of the PHCN staff, in spite of the enormous economic challenges of the moment.
“Suffice it to state that we inherited a huge wage bill of over N7bn monthly for the PHCN staff. However, with the new increase, the monthly salary will escalate to over N11bn. This figure is interestingly about the same amount the PHCN generates monthly”.
The Vice- President, however, clarified that the almost one per cent who were yet to be paid were those with incomplete records or whose next of kin had not been ascertained.
“Once each case is sorted out, the payment shall be made as enough funds still exist with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) for the settlement of this outstanding liability”.
Sambo further reiterated government’s commitment to the promotion of the interest of the electricity workers just as he maintained that President Goodluck Jonathan had directed that a percentage of shares in the PHCN successor companies which were being privatised be reserved for the PHCN staff.