WorldStage Newsonline– The Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) has said that it is working at re-evaluating PPPs to prevent unqualified contractors from causing issues when serious investors were willing to partner with the government.
The Director-General of ICRC, Dr Jobson Ewalefoh, disclosed this when he paid a courtesy visit to the Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, Adegboyega Oyetola.
According to a statement signed by Ifeanyi Nwoko, ICRC,’s Acting Head of Media and Publicity, Ewalefoh said the commission will finalise all Public Private Partnership (PPP) projects yet to proceed over one year after the Federal Executive Council(FEC) approval.
The D-G informed the minister that some of the pioneer PPP projects approved in 2006 were under the purview of the ministry.
He stated that the commission had come to ascertain the challenges affecting PPP projects in the ministry and review the issues inhibiting projects already approved and those in the pipeline.
Ewalefoh said this was necessary given the importance of the maritime sector to the development and growth of any nation.
He informed the minister that the ICRC had streamlined the processes to accelerate project delivery to align with the demand of the times.
Ewalefoh said this was in response to the charge by President Bola Tinubu on the need to proactively adopt PPPs in the delivery of infrastructure.
According to him, this is to ensure that projects are delivered faster without compromising standards or circumventing the law.
The D-G said that while the commission was striving to commence new PPP projects, it was also working to effectively optimise the existing ones.
He said the commission had adopted the concept of attaining project effectiveness after project execution by introducing Conditions Precedent through timelines for the achievement of financial close for the private partners.
“This is in a bid to ensure that projects were not stalled due to the inability of proponents to raise the required financing required to execute projects.
“This ensures that contracts are automatically terminated when the timeline agreed expires without the private partner achieving financial close.
“This approach is intended to protect the country and ensure that the mistakes of the past are not repeated and the government is never held to ransom.
“ This will ensure that only credible investors are encouraged to participate while discouraging portfolio investors or expert bidders without the actual intention of executing projects.”
Ewalefoh urged the minister to partner with the commission to re-evaluate all PPP projects that have been approved by FEC for more than a year without any appreciable progress.
In his response, the Minister congratulated the D-G on his appointment.
Oyetola said that most of the projects that had stalled were because of access to financing due to the lack of capacity of the private parties.
He stated that he has held meetings with some of the project proponents and discovered that financing was the main challenge.
The minister advised the need to ensure that only investors that have proven capacity to finance projects were brought on board in the future and not just entities with beautifully prepared business cases.
He assured the D-G of the ministry’s full support in accelerating PPP in the blue economy.
Oyetola said that there were already a couple of new projects which would be sent to the ICRC to begin the PPP process.
