BY XOLISANI NCUBE
THE Harare City Council (HCC) has shown no appetite to award a US$134 million tender to Netherlands-based Integrated Energy B.V (IEBV) for the construction of a waste-to-energy plant at the Pomona dumpsite, citing lack of technical capacity.
Minutes of the joint environmental, finance and business committees meeting held on June 24 and approved by the full council last week, state that councillors were not impressed by the presentation from IEBV team.
“After the presentation, the committee expressed concern at the presentation. The committee accordingly tasked the town clerk (Hosiah Chisango) to assess potential partners,” read part of the minutes.
According to the minutes, the committee was worried that IEBV had not done a similar initiative in any African county and only implemented a pilot project in eastern Europe.
“There had not been any projects done in Africa, but the company wanted to implement the project in Ghana and Zimbabwe. The only pilot project was in eastern Europe,” read the minutes.
The move by the councillors comes as IEBV had signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with government, through the Local Government Ministry and council last month.
This was despite the fact that the company did not participate in the tendering process, according to highly placed HCC sources. The company is reportedly owned by a Dutch national called Klodian Zoto.
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Previous council minutes showed that Local Government minister, July Moyo directed council to consider IEBV for the project, notwithstanding the on-going tendering process.
The tender scope entailed construction of a waste processing plant with energy recovery by producing electricity, which would be fed into the national grid.
According to the presentation the company has a capital base of around €120 million (US$135 million), €5 million (US$5,63 million) bank loan and the rest would be financed through suppliers’ contracts and periodic payments by government.
After lengthy debate, councillors resolved to task town clerk, Hosiah Chisango to present a progress report for the development of the waste to energy plant in Harare.
