By Kabir Muhammad
Abuja – The FCT Minister, Malam Muhammad Bello, has restated the efficacy of Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) model of infrastructure development as a sure strategy for meeting the infrastructure needs of a fast growing city like Abuja.
Bello said this while receiving the report of the Inter-Ministerial Committee on the Abandoned Katampe District Infrastructure Project on Friday in Abuja.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the minister set up the Committee in March 2017 to review the N61 billion Katampe District Engineering Infrastructure project and make recommendations on the way forward.
“Katampe has to be made to work, or else, the future of developing infrastructure in the city will be bleak.
“Again, if we allow the city to develop at this rate, with demography astronomically outstripping infrastructure, eventually, Abuja would be like many other African cities.
“Consequently, all the reasons for which it was created 40 years ago as well as the huge investments made into it would have just gone down the drain,’’ he said.
According to the minister, it has become necessary to revive the project to put the city’s infrastructure development at par with its demographic, economic and geographic expansion.
He lauded the hard work and commitment with which the Committee handled the assignment.
Bello also expressed confidence that the report will enable the FCT Administration to leverage the lessons learnt from past mistakes in order to move forward on future PPP projects.
The minister said since inception, the FCT had basically depended solely on federal budgetary allocations to be what it is now.
He noted that the Katampe PPP arrangement was designed to augment whatever fund was coming from the Federal Government to speed up Abuja’s infrastructure development through private sector partnership initiatives.
“Katampe is just in Phase Two while the districts in Phase Two are over 20. twenty similar “Katampes” are waiting to be developed, out of which nearly 80 per cent may have already been allocated.
“Apart from Phase Two, there is also Phase 3, which alone has almost 30 to 35 districts, others include Phase 4, which has been planned and Phase 5, undergoing planning now.
“The journey of a thousand miles begins with a step,’’ he added.
He affirmed that his Administration would give the provision of infrastructure all the seriousness it deserved in the Territory.
The Chairman of the Committee, Mr Zanna Baba-Gana, lamented the “slipshod” manner with which the procurement process was undertaken, especially the absence of due diligence in the arrival of the contractual terms.
He said these were responsible for the many issues that were encountered in the execution process, adding that the FCTA in-house supervising team was weak and lacked the full powers to actually take control of the project.
“The project was to be partially financed through the development levies the land allottees were charged to pay under a given time-frame of 36 months.
“It had been expected that the project was to be completed within the period, but as we are reporting to you now, I don’t think up to 30 per cent has been collected from allottees,’’ he said.
The chairman said that the ripple effect of the non-payment of the levies was that FCTA, which was supposed to provide 45 per cent of the finance required, could not meet up with its own part of the obligations.
This, Baba-Gana, explained, was part of the reasons the developers suspended work.
Among other issues raised at the presentation was the non-involvement of relevant departments in the project negotiation process.
He noted that when the Committee sought information from the Debt Management Office (DMO) on the subject of the issue of guarantees, it was apparent DMO was also not involved.
The Committee specifically recommended the amendment of the contract agreement and the continuation of the project based on fulfillment of certain conditions and in the light of liabilities that will be associated with the cancellation of the project, among others.(NAN)