‘Why Jonathan is yet to approve Maevis’ sack’

By Wole Shadare Ngrguardiannews.com

FRESH facts have emerged on why President Goodluck Jonathan has not approved the termination of the concession agreement between Maevis Limited and the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN).
A source said President Jonathan was not too pleased with the way the concession deal was terminated, considering his insistence on adherence to the rule of law on every issue.

The source did not, however, say whether he would wade into the matter in view of condemnations that have trailed the action of both the Minister of Aviation, Stella Oduah-Ogiewonyi and FAAN in the termination of Maevis’ concession agreement.

President Jonathan had requested Oduah-Ogiewonyi to “obtain the views of establishments such as the Ministry of Justice, Bureau of Public Enterprise (BPE) and the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) on the matter”, following her letter to him seeking approval for termination of the agreement.

In the letter, the minister sought the President’s approval to, “cancel/discontinue all un-performing concessions and lease agreements and replace same with a new model of management under a joint venture platform that promises higher returns to the government and people of Nigeria, as well as the JV partners”.
The letter, with reference number, HMA/O1/Vol.1, dated December 30, 2011, reads in part: “Your Excellency may wish to note that upon my assumption of office, the ministry caused to be carried out, an extensive review of all concession and lease agreements with a view to ascertaining that the agreements were not only heavily skewed against the government but also that they were performing according to expectations.

“At the end of that exercise, it was discovered that most of the concession and lease agreements were under-performing and failing dismally to deliver expected returns”.

President Jonathan, however, in his reply to the minister in a letter dated January 18, 2012, directed that both FAAN and Maevis seek arbitration if any of them was dissatisfied with the terms of agreement, noting that there is a court injunction directing FAAN and Maevis to maintain the status quo until the matter was resolved amicably.

FAAN officials had on March 24, 2012, in an alleged commando-like operation, stormed the firm’s third floor offices at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, vandalised over N9 billion equipment belonging to the firm and detained some of the workers before terminating the 10-year concession deal.
But the Managing Director of FAAN, George Uriesi, denied that the authority forcefully sacked Maevis, just as he maintained that the firm quit on “mutual agreement”.

Maevis, provider of airport operations management system at some of the nation’s international airports, is one of FAAN’s numerous concessionaires.

On October 31, 2007, FAAN entered into an agreement with the company to acquire, install, operate and manage an integrated Airport Operation Management System (AOMS), Common User Self-Service System, (CUSS), Flight Information Display System (FIDS) and an Airport Pricing and Billing System at four international airports.

According to FAAN, the aim of the agreement was to put in place an electronic payment system to stave off leakages in its revenue generation and earn more money for airport development and maintenance.
The agreement also specified that Maevis should solely fund the project at a total cost of N3,959,293,695.97 and operate the facility for 10 years in the first instance, after which it would be renewed for another five years, subject to performance.

Based on the agreement, FAAN was to pay Maevis two per cent of the base revenue collected and where revenue collected exceeded FAAN’s projected base revenue (as contained in Schedule 3 of the annexure to the agreement in any year), 35 per cent of that additional revenue above the agency’s 2007 numbers was to be paid to Maevis.