What are Public corporations?
These are companies, establishments or enterprises which are owned and financed by the government. The main purpose of public corporations is to render essential social and welfare services at affordable prices. There are public corporations in Nigeria. Some of them are:
Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC)
Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)
Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA)
Nigerian Television Authority (NTA)
Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN)
National Bureau of Statistics (NBS)
National Teachers Institute (NTI)
National Universities Commission (NUC)
Although Public Corporations are established to provide services, they are also expected to make profit so they can be self-sustaining. However, profit-making is not the main aim for its establishment.
This article provides information on public service corporations in Nigeria.
Examples of Public Corporations in Nigeria
Read on below:
Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria (FRCN)
Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria (FRCN) is a government-owned radio broadcasting organization that is it belongs to the federal government. FRCN has many subsidiaries which are domestic radio networks such as Radio Nigeria. FRCN also has FM stations across the 36 states and zonal stations in the 6 geopolitical zones in Nigeria.
FRCN’s owns a domestic radio service called Radio Nigeria. Radio Nigeria has 25 stations located across the country. Another subsidiary of FRCN is Voice of Nigeria. With all of these, FRCN considers itself to have the largest radio network in Africa.
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation is the oil corporation through which the federal government of Nigeria regulates the country’s petroleum industry.
NNPC business operations are managed through Strategic Business and Corporate Services Units (SBUs/CSUs) in diverse locations across Nigeria. The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) recruits on a yearly basis.
Management of NNPC
The NNPC Group comprises the NNPC Board of directors, the Managing director and seven operational units. Each operational unit has a chief operating officer (COO) while its divisions are headed by Group General Managers (GGM). NNPC also has several subsidiary companies that are headed by Managing Directors. The corporation is solely responsible for upstream and downstream developments in the Nigerian oil industry. It is also charged with regulating and supervising the oil industry on behalf of the Nigerian Government.
The Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA)
This is the Nigerian federal government agency that governs and operates the ports of Nigeria. The major ports controlled by the NPA include:
The Lagos Port Complex
Tin Can Island Port in Lagos
Calabar Port
Delta Port
Rivers Port
Port Harcourt
Onne Port.
The Nigerian Ports Authority carries out its operations in affiliation with the Ministry of Transportation (Nigeria) and the Nigerian Shippers’ Council. The Head office of the Nigerian Ports Authority is located in Marina, Lagos.
The Nigerian ports, has been leased since 2005 due to a program of the federal government at promoting efficiency through, public and private partnership,
The Nigerian Television Authority
The Nigerian Television Authority (popularly known as NTA) is a broadcasting service owned by the Nigerian government. The broadcast service was first known as the Nigerian Television (NTV). It was inaugurated in 1977 with a monopoly on national television broadcasting, this means it was the only broadcasting service in the country. It however lost its monopoly over television broadcasting in Nigeria in the 1990s. NTA has presence in several parts of the country. It boasts of running the largest television network in Nigeria.
The Power Holding Company of Nigeria
The Power Holding Company of Nigeria (abbreviated as PHCN), used to be known as the National Electric Power Authority. It is an organization responsible for governing the use of electricity in Nigeria.
However, on 30 September 2013, PHCN ceased to exist. This was after the privatization process initiated by the Good luck Jonathan regime. In its stead, the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) was established. It is responsible for monitoring and regulating the Nigerian electricity industry. It has the power to issue licenses to market participants, and ensure partners and stakeholders comply with market rules and operating guidelines.
National Bureau of Statistics
The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) was founded when the Federal Office of Statistics (FOS) was merged with the National Data Bank (NDB). Its creation was part of the implementation of a program called the Statistical Master Plan (SMP).
The merger was done in a bid to give the agency a national outlook and make it the first and ultimate statistical agency for all three tiers of Government.
NBS is responsible for the coordination of all statistical operations in the country. It also produces the official statistics of all ministries, departments and agencies in the country, from federal to local government level.
Operations of the National Bureau of Statistics
Nigeria operates a federal system of government with 36 states, a Federal Capital Territory and 774 Local Government Areas (LGAs). At the federal level, each ministry, department and agency has a Director of Statistics. Each state also has a Director of Statistics while local government areas have a Head of statistics Unit.
National Teachers Institute (NTI)
The National Teachers’ Institute is located in Kaduna. It is a distance education institution established for the purpose of training teachers for the benefit of the educational system. It was established in 1976 by Act No. 7 of 10th April, 1978 when there was a pressing needs for trained and qualified teaching staff at all a of the educational system.
The National Teachers’ Institute was setup to serve as a Distant Learning Educational Institution in order to provide additional means of tackling the following challenges facing Teacher Education in Nigeria. Among many other goals, the National Teacher’s Institute was established to meet the following challenges:
- Educate and provide truly professionalized teachers at all levels of the government.
- To act as an advisory agency in the Cabinet Office
Operations of the National Universities Commission (NUC)
The National Universities Commission (NUC is a parastatal under the Federal Ministry of Education (FME). The Commission has a Governing Council.
These are some of the public corporations in Nigeria, established to provide services while self-sustaining itself.