By Raphael Ekpang
The Joint Committee of the House of Representatives investigating the performance of Public Private Partnership programme and concessions has invited the Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Prof. Muhammad Ali Pate.
The House Joint Committee, Public Assets and Special Duties also summoned one of the firms involved in the PPP and Concessions, MDS Logistics to appear before it.
The Lead Chairman of the Committee and Chairman, House Committee on Public Assets, Hon. (Barr) Ademorin Kuye announced this following the resolution of the committee members that team from Ministry of Health and Social Services failed to give satisfactory responses on the management of PPP and Concessions when they appeared before them.
The team led by Prof. Sydney Ibeanusi, Director, PPP Diaspora, Federal Ministry of Health and Social Services in their submission noted that the ministry runs PPP programme with some private companies.
One of such partnerships according to the delegation is the ‘Warehouse in a Box Project’ (Operation and Maintenance of Federal Central Medical Warehouse Lagos, and the Premier Medical Warehouse Abuja).
The two warehouses located in Abuja and Lagos are prefabricated and identical with a combine total floor space of 6,530m2 and the capacity to hold 7,680 pallet spaces. They are insulated warehouses made up of pre-engineered modular components as well as the fittings and operating components including offices, furnishings, racking, kitting, security and office equipment.
The Abuja warehouse was commissioned in 2017 while that of Lagos was commissioned in 2018.
However, in the name of partnership, the Federal Ministry of Health and Social Services handed over the warehouses to a company, MDS Logistics in 2019 for their management for a period of five years.
The lawmakers argued that the management of these warehouses in the last few years fell short of expectation.
The committee noted several discrepancies in the PPP agreement with MDS. The major one was the payment terms to the federation which was initially meant to be after the 5 year concession period
The new administration noticing this, renegotiated for payment of all the revenues that have accrued to the federal government during the 4 years that the concession had run so far.
The only payment made, came with massive deductions for maintenance of the facility which should have been borne by the partners in the concession according to their agreed sharing formula.
The committee lamented that lack of proper management of PPP and Concessions was one of the factors responsible for the failure of several health facilities during COVID-19.
The lawmakers also maintained that their observation indicates that some of the PPP and Concessions are not in compliance with Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC).
Hon. Kuye said the specific date and time of appearance before the committee will be communicated to the minister and management of MDS Logistics.
