Slovak News Back to the news
Figel: Termination of PPP Contract for D1 Sections to Cost €81 million
Monday 27 September 2010 Zoom in | Print page
Bratislava, September 27 (TASR) - The planned termination of the contract with the consortium Slovenske Dialnice (Slovak Highways) regarding one of three public-private-partnership (PPP) packages for construction of selected D1 highway sections will cost Slovakia tens of millions of euros, it became clear on Monday.
"I'm submitting a paper informing the Government on termination the concession contract, and at the same time requesting an extra allocation of €81 million to settle all the respective business relations," said Transport Minister Jan Figel (KDH).
This means that the Government, in two phases, will have to pay nearly €38 million to the consortium for the already-carried out groundwork, and further costs are expected to total €43 million. Figel said these include the costs related to the site conservation works, advisory services, technical assistance provided by the National Highway Company (NDS), surveying, and property settlement.
The minister went on to criticise the former government (led by Robert Fico) and Transport Ministry management for their decision to procure the three massive PPP packages instead of dividing them into several smaller ones. He said that the ministry actually had a feasibility study done in 2007. "Its conclusions were proposing the procurement to be carried out step-by-step. The reality was different, however," said Figel.
According to Figel, his predecessor Lubomir Vazny (Smer-SD) already in 2006 said that highway construction via PPP would be 50-70 percent more expensive than if financed by the state. Despite all of this, the previous government gave a green light to these projects and, moreover, it was unable to pay for them even in the period of accelerating economic growth (in 2007 and early 2008 - ed. note), said Figel.
All rights reserved. Any publishing or further dissemination of press releases and photographs from TASR's resources without TASR's prior written approval constitutes a violation of the Copyrights Act.
