By Sami Zaptia.
Tripoli, 21 May 2013:
Housing and Utilities Minister Ali Sherief revealed at Sunday’s Prime Ministerial press conference that contracts with . . .[restrict]local companies for 90 projects covering about 18,000 housing units were signed.
He admitted that the delay in the activation of the budget has held up these companies’ upfront 50 percent payment. However, he was confident that this would resume shortly.
Minister Sherief went out of his way to mention some Libyan companies by name that continued to implement projects despite not receiving payment.
The Minister confirmed his government’s continued negotiations with foreign companies in an effort to restart stalled projects. He referred to the agreement reached with the Chinese company in the Benghazi project and said that negotiations with the Turks were continuing.
Minister Sherief also referred to the attempt by the government to kick start a parallel initiative to get the private sector contractors, Libyan local banks and the Planning Authority to work on opening new areas for development. A vision for this initiative should be ready within one and a half months, the Minister added.
Minister Sherief also repeated the earlier announcement that 6,500 prefabricated housing units will also be built as a short term measure for the housing crises. [/restrict]
