The Federal Executive Council, FEC, Wednesday, approved N1.4 billion contract for the design of a 12-floor building for the Department of Petroleum Resources, DPR.
Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, stated this while briefing State House correspondents at the end of FEC meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari at the Council Chamber, Presidential Villa, Abuja, Okechukwu Enelamah-Minister of Trade and Investment
Kachikwu said, “FEC approved N1.4 billion for the design of DPR Head office in Abuja. The contract was awarded to Messers Arteck Practice Limited to design a 12 floor building in the land that is already allocated to DPR over the years by the FCT to enable them move their headquarters down here.
“They are currently based in Lagos and are the regulatory and supervisory arm of the ministry of petroleum, and is instrumental in terms of income generation.”
He explained that the contract was awarded to DPR tenders board and that “their bid was the lowest, while the highest bid was about N3 billion, the next bid was N2m+ and then the third was about N1.4 billion.
“The total projected potential cost for the building when it is done is about N35 billion. So if you look at that as a percentage of the work, it is absolutely insignificant, in international terms it is very justifiable, it is less than two per cent.”
He said that the Minister of FCT did mention in their deliberation that because of the new zoning policies around the FCT, the previous plan which was to build a car park of another five floors along with the 12 floors may have to change a little bit because they were taking possession of some of the green areas that ordinarily were assigned to them.
“So, they might just have to elevate the building a bit more and have more parking within the building. So given the volume of work to be done, I think relative to the contract sum and in line with international practice, it is quite frankly very reasonable,” he said.
Also briefing journalists, Okechukwu Enelamah, Minister of Trade and Investment, said that FEC approved the appointment of a contract of N1.5 billion for consultancy job.
Enelamah said, “We got an approval from FEC to award a contract to engage a Programme Management Office Consultant and System Provider, for the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme, GEEP at the cost of N1.556 billion.”
He explained that the contract which was for the provision of services for 4.6 million people, was a viable contract, noting that the programme has provided credit for over 1.5 million Nigerians.
