Nigeria privatisation boss suspended
Nigeria - Corporate - 03-09-2010

The head of Nigeriaquotes privatisation agency was suspended on 8 March 2010, weeks after confusion emerged over the planned sale of former state telecoms monopoly Nitel. A presidency spokesman confirmed that Acting President Goodluck Jonathan had approved the suspension of Christopher Anyanwu from his position as Director General of the Bureau of Public Enterprises, but gave no reason for the move. quoteI can confirm to you that he is now under suspension,quote Ima Niboro said, without commenting further. The BPE is responsible for overseeing the privatisation of Nitel, a process which last month became bogged down in confusion over the financial backers for a USD 2.5bn preferred bid approved by the body. The preferred bidder for Nitel was announced on 16 February 2010 and Nigeria said the consortium included Unicom, Chinaquotes second biggest carrier, little known Dubai company Minerva and a small local carrier.

Doubts arose when Unicom initially denied any involvement, but the Chinese firm later acknowledged its European unit had shown interest in joining the group bidding for Nitel although it had never entered formal negotiations. Uncertainty over the bid also arose because of the mysterious identity of the group in Dubai which the consortium said would provide much of the financing for a bid that was five times higher than many analysts believed Nitel was worth. The National Council on Privatisation the BPEquotes governing body of which Acting President Goodluck Jonathan is the chairman said two weeks ago it had cleared up confusion over the USD 2.5bn bid, allowing it to go for final approval. The NCP said the bid had been examined by its technical committee and it was satisfied due process had been followed to the highest international standards. Nigeria has been trying to sell Nitel for almost a decade and the controversy over the latest effort to do so is embarrassing for sub-Saharan Africaquotes second biggest economy.

Source: Reuters