FINANCING OF GOVERNMENT PARASTATALS (A CASE STUDY OF POWER HOLDINGS PLC)
ABSTRACT
There are always different kinds of goods and services available to the economic units in every economic system which are categorized into private and solid goods. Private goods are those goods which companies and individual produce and supply for the consumption of people while social goods by their nature in meeting the welfare needs of the economics units are those goods that are produced and supplied by government, social goods or services which the sole responsibility of government to provide include electricity, water, roads, education communication media etc in the various government parastatals and ministries. This study is purely on the provision of electricity to the citizenry to note that government parastatals are solely owned and funded by government further smooth operations. Inefficiency in the performance of government parastatals has been attributed to inadequate financing and poor management of the fund by government. As a result government, government parastatals such as NEPA, NITEL have gone commercial in their operations while others have become privatized.
The main thrust of this study is to research into the financing of National Electric Power Authority (NEPA) being the only generator and supply of electricity in Nigeria as a government parastatal with a view to evaluating its performance based on statutory financial provisions.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
It is an acknowledged fact that in a developing economy, government is always seen as the prime mover of the economy and this situation will remain so far a very long time to come in developing countries. According to Jaivaharial Wehru of India, the trend of events is to make the state more and more the organizer of constructive industry and not the private capitalist or any other person. The services provided by public utilities are essential for economic growth and development. It is obvious that no government can progress very fast without the requisite “social overhead” so called by economic growth theorists. Basically, the three types of social overhead capital necessary for economic growth which are of great interest to this writer are:
1. Effective transportation
2. Flexible and reliable power source
3. Good communication
