Uganda Refinery lead advisor expected to be known by July 2014

Uganda has received detailed proposals for the role of lead investor for the development of 60,000 barrels per day oil refinery in Hoima.

The proposals submitted by four of six shortlisted firms for the project including China Petroleum Pipeline Bureau (CPPB) from China, Marubeni Corporation from Japan, – Global Resources from Russia and SK Group from South Korea.

According to the permanent secretary in the ministry of energy and mineral resources development Kabagambe-Kaliisa the quick submission attests the competitiveness of Uganda’s refinery project and the East African region’s business environment that provides an excellent investment destination.

“We expect that the bids submitted will be in line with Government of Uganda’s requirements for a credible, experienced and financially capable partner to work with Uganda to develop a refinery,” he said.

The submissions follow a bidders conference held in March 2014 in Kampala that gave an opportunity to the prospective bidders to be briefed on the project and obtain clarifications regarding the Request for Proposal (RFP).

The bidders were also given the opportunity to visit the Hoima refinery project site as well as some oil fields and network will oil companies involved in the drilling thus an opportunity for them to dialogue on crude supply arrangements.

Notably  PETROFAC and VITOL SA from the UAE and Switzerand respectively did not submit proposals with the Arab company indicating it had opted to concentrate on their core business in engineering, procurement and construction for the upstream petroleum sub-sector.

Uganda says VITOL SA blames internal reasons from the consortium sector for the failure to submit the proposals.

From here an evaluation team comprising of Uganda government representatives and TaylorDeJongh the transaction advisor for the government will assess the proposals with the winner being announced in July.

The winner will then embark with negotiations with the government which are expected to be concluded by the fourth quarter of 2014.