Arrangements were at an advanced stage to secure the funds from the Chinese government in the form of loans.
The minister of Power, Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, disclosed this while briefing journalists on the progress made by his ministry to mark his three years in office.
The minister stated that work on the Mambilla Power Plant, which had suffered several setbacks for over 40 years, is set to commence from early 2019.
According to Fashola, while the Federal Executive Council (FEC) has approved the project, President Muhammadu Buhari is committed to ensuring the urgent commencement of the project, which is expected to be completed within 60 months.
On the level of development of the project, Fashola said,
“the progress is that for the first time in over 40 years the federal government has now signed an engineering and procurement contract. President Buhari has made that possible.
“All the companies that were fighting themselves and going to court when we came are out of court. We have a contract, a joint venture; we created that joint venture; we have a contract with them we have signed. FEC has approved the project; it is going to cost $5.72 billion,” he said.
On the choice of the Chinese company, CGCC, to handle the construction of the project, Fashola stated that apart from getting funding from the Chinese, the company in question built China’s Gorges Dam which, he said, is similar to the Mambilla power plant.
“They have the technology; they have done it before; no need to reinvent the wheel. We will take a loan; we are now trying to negotiate the final tranche of the loan,” he said.
On how the government is pursuing the project execution, the minister said, “The Nigerian government is supposed to provide 15 percent of the total cost of the project as its counterpart funding.
On the economic benefits the project will bring to the country while it is under construction, Fashola said the ministry has received over 116 expressions of interest from indigenous companies that are ready to provide various services.
He said,
“They are not involved in construction; they are just trying to position themselves to provide logistics for the construction.
“They will provide financial services such as banking services – because the money has to move through banks, insurance for goods, freight for goods, transport logistics and security.
“We are drawing up guidelines for the procurement, especially to optimize the president’s directive on Executive Order 5 for the local content and Nigerians are going to benefit from this investment. Anything Nigeria can do in this project, no foreigner will be allowed to take it.”
Earlier, the minister, in his address, listed the achievements of the power sector to include increase of power generation from 4,000 megawatts (MW) in 2015 to 7,000mw, transmission from 5,000MW to 7000MW and distribution from 2690MW to 5,222MW.
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