Africa Finance Corporation/Mota Engel Consortium, Africa Plus Partners Consortium, Dafac Consortium and Enyimba Economic City Development Company Consortium, among others, are the shortlisted preferred bidders for the 12 federal highways put up for concession by the Federal Government.

It would be recalled that Federal Government had identified preferred/reserved bidders for the highways under the Highway Development and Management Initiative. The government was, however, silent on the identities of the preferred bidders.

It had explained that this was following the conclusion of the evaluation of the proposals submitted for phase one of the value-added concession under the HDMI.

The HDMI is a PPP initiative of the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing that seeks to attract sustainable investment and funding in the development of road infrastructure and maximise the use of assets along the right-of-way of federal highways across the country.

The first phase of the value-added concession under the HDMI seeks to concession 12 economically viable road corridors to technically and financially capable private sector firms/consortia.

The 12 highways represent 1,963km or 5.6 per cent of Nigeria’s 35,000km federal highways, which include Benin-Asaba, Abuja-Lokoja, Kano-Katsina, Onitsha-Owerri-Aba, Sagamu-Benin and Abuja-Keffi-Akwanga highways.

Others include Kano-Maiduguri (Kano-Shuarin), Kano-Maiduguri (Potiskum-Damaturu), Lokoja-Benin, Enugu-Port Harcourt, Ilorin-Jebba, Lagos-Otta-Abeokuta and Lagos-Badagry-Seme border.

Documents seen by our correspondent in Abuja on Wednesday named some of the preferred bidders selected for the 12 roads including Africa Finance Corporation/Mota Engel Consortium to handle the Shagamu-Benin and Lagos-Badagry road.

Others include Africa Plus Partners Consortium to handle Benin-Asaba and Lagos-Abeokuta; CCCC-CGC-Hdwaks Joint Venture: Ilorin-Jebba; Dafac Consortium: Kano-Shuari; and Enyimba Economic City Development Company Consortium: Enugu-Port Harcourt and Onitsha-Aba.

This came as sources familiar with the HDMI concession programme process confirmed that the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing, and the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission had commenced notification of preferred bidders for the programme.

“The next phase of the programme is the negotiation stage, during which preferred bidders will be invited to negotiate financial terms,” an official with the FMWH stated.

The official added, “These terms shall then be used by the ministry and its advisers to develop and submit a full business case to the ICRC for compliance certification and onward transmission to the Federal Executive Council for final approval.”

In a previous engagement with the media, acting Director-General, ICRC, Mike Ohiani, said Nigeria’s new tolling policy was approved by the Federal Executive Council in 2021 and that the ICRC, in the exercise of its statutory mandate, reviewed and certified the 12 OBCs to enable the project move to the private sector procurement stage.

“In doing that, the commission provided PPP pre-contract regulatory guidance to the Federal Ministry of Works for the bid documents,” Ohiani had stated.

Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, had also stated that the policy was developed after due consultations with various stakeholders in the transportation sector.

A total of 75 bidders had responded to the initial Request-For-Qualification, 12 bidders were shortlisted for the Request-For-Proposal.

It was learnt that companies/consortia participating in the process include Africa Finance Corporation/Mota Engil Consortium, Africa Plus Partners Nigeria Limited Consortium, Avia Infrastructure Services Limited and CCCC-CGC-Hdwaks Joint Venture.

Others include China Harbour Engineering Company, Craneberg Construction Company Limited, Dafac Consortium, Deanshanger Consortium, Enyimba Economic City Development Company Consortium, Julius Berger and Setraco.

Punch