The Federal Executive Council has given approval for the appointment of consultants for the concession of the Dadinkowa hydropower project.
Minister of Water Resources, Suleiman Adamu, who made the disclosure to State House Correspondents, said the concession period is for five years in the first instance and N605 million was approved as consultancy fee for the five years.
“Today, I presented three memos at Council. All of them have to do with public-private partnership arrangements. The first one is for the appointment of a consultant to supervise the concession of the Dadinkowa 40 Megawatts Hydropower Project.
“The project was completed in the last year. It’s already injecting power into the national grid. It is in Dadinkowa, Gombe State. Part of the agreement for the concession is that an independent consultant be appointed to supervise the operations and things related to income generation and other things by the concessionaire.
“Council approves the appointment of consultants to that effect for the first five years. It is renewable every five years up to a total of 25 years. Fees agreed of N605 million for the first five years and then subsequently, based on the performance of the consultant, it can be reviewed. So, the memo was presented by me on behalf of the Upper Benue River Basin Development Authority,” the Minister explained.
Adamu also disclosed that the council approved the regularisation of the leasing of hectares of land owned by the Upper Benue River Basin Authority, for commercial use by farmers.
He said: “The second memo is just to regularize an ongoing lease arrangement with a concessionaire under the auspices of the Upper Niger River Basin Development Authority. We have large hectares of land allocated to the River Basin Development Authority over the years. But they have not been able to invest and put them to use.
“So, when we came into office, we directed that all lands owned by the River Basin Development Authority but not cultivated should be handed over to commercial farmers on a lease arrangement.
“A lot of cases have been done. First, in 2016, we allocated a total of 50,000 hectares. And then thereafter, the National Council on Privatization came to work with us and the ministry towards partial commercialization leading to the eventual full commercialization of the River Basin Development Authority. And for that to happen, we have to leverage on the existing assets and make sure we put them to proper use.
“So, this is one of the things that was done by regularising this lease which was already in place for 10 years and now extended to 30 years.”
Dominica Nwabufo
