By KEILE CAMPBELL

kcampbell@tribunemedia.net

FORMER Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Works Desmond Bannister said the recently tabled Electricity Bill would empower the government to transfer Bahamas Power and Light (BPL) assets to subsidiary companies.

Elected officials are expected to debate the Electricity Bill today in Parliament.

Bannister said: “This is an example that I’ve been running through my mind: BPL forms a subsidiary company in which they own 50 per cent of the shares and they bring in someone who they call a strategic partner or manager or whatever, and those persons are allocated 50 per cent of the shares; then BPL takes $100m, which these generators are worth, and transfers it into this joint venture. Well, the value of BPL’s assets have just depreciated by 50 per cent.”

He questioned whether the partnering company in such a scenario would make tangible investments. He said a challenge is that while BPL would partner with a private entity to reduce electricity costs for Bahamians, the private company will seek profits.

“Suppose, for example, $100m worth of generators are put into a company that’s gonna generate electricity,” he said. “The other person comes in and says, well I bring 30 years experience in operating this kind of company, so that’s worth $50m, so they may bring in intangibles rather than tangibles. They may bring in some tangibles, but what they bring in doesn’t necessarily increase the value of the asset.”

Mr Bannister said the bill “doesn’t provide safeguards for the process”, adding: “It has no procurement guidelines, it has no provisions for employees, and it has no provisions for transfer of liabilities.”

He said his legal background makes him concerned about what the bill could cause for BPL workers.

“The bill says you can transfer the functions, and you can transfer the assets of BPL, but it doesn’t say you can transfer the employees; it provides no safeguard for them,” he said. 

Bahamas Electrical Managers Union (BEMU) secretary general Graham McKinney said his union was not informed about the bill.

“We thought that we were at a place where it wouldn’t have been such a surprise to have heard it come across the airwaves and all the changes that were mentioned,” he told The Tribune, adding the union is engaging the minister responsible for BPL to understand the legislation because members are “very concerned”.

He said members are concerned about job security since the Electricity Bill facilitates the establishment of new subsidiaries under BPL, which would split the management of generation, transmission, and distribution.