By Nicole Augustine
President Muhammadu Buhari administration, barely a few weeks from exiting office, the Federal Executive Council (FEC) has approved N605 million as a consultancy fee for the supervision of the concession of the Dandikowa 40 megawatts hydropower project.
The memo which came up for deliberations at the extraordinary FEC meeting presided over by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo on Monday, resolved that part of the agreement for the concession is the appointment of an independent consultant to supervise the operations especially those related to the income generated by the concessionaire.
The Minister of Water Resources, Suleiman Adamu while briefing State House Correspondents on the project noted that it is for the first five years renewable every five years for a total of 25 years.
“Council approved three memos by the Ministry of water resources, all of them have to do with PPP. The first is the appointment of a consultant to supervise the concession of the Dandikowa 40 megawatts hydropower project for the first five years. The project was completed in the last year, it’s already injecting power into the national grid, it is in Dandikowa in Gombe State.
“The amount is N605 million for the first five years and then subsequently based on the performance of the consultant, it can be renewed. The consultant is named Messes Pienet. So the memo was presented on behalf of Development authority,” he noted.
Suleiman went further to explain that a second memo had to do with the regularization of an ongoing lease arrangement with a concessionaire under the auspices of the Upper Niger River Basin Development Authority.
He said there had been a large tract of land that was allocated to the river basin development authorities over the years.
According to the Water Resources Minister, upon assumption of office, a directive was given that all those lands owned by the Lebanese whether or not being cultivated should be handed over to commercial farmers on a lease arrangement.
” In 2016 we allocated a total of 50,000 hectares. Thereafter the National Council on Privatization came to work with us in the ministry towards partial commercialization or leasing to eventual full commercialization of the river basin development authorities.
“For that to happen, we had to leverage the existing assets and make sure we put them to proper use. So this is one of the things that was done by regularizing it.
“This lease, which was already in place for 10 years and now extended to 30 years was because it’s on the requests of the concessionaire.
“We also observed that short term lease most investors or funders don’t want to put their money for short-term concessions, especially issues related to agriculture, you know, because of the high risk involved. So Council approved that extension from 10 years, at least to 25 years,” Suleiman noted.