Despite the widespread approval of the decision of the Minister of Finance, Abdul Wahhab Al-Rasheed, to stop the renewal of state property contracts under the ‘B.O.T’ (build-operate-transfer) system and referring them to the Public-Private Partnership Authority (PPPA), a few days after its issuance, he faces legal and parliamentary skepticism about the soundness of the procedure.
In this regard, legal sources told Al-Rai that “proceeding with the decision without amending it in accordance with the requirements of the law will enable investors, owners of BOT projects that will be referred to the Partnership Authority, to request large sums of money in compensation, which will put undue pressure on the government Treasury.
The sources indicated that “the legal concerns in this regard are based on the fact that the projects of the contracted state property contracts (BOT) are signed under Law 105 of 1980, and then their referral according to the Partnership Authority Law is subject to judicial challenge,” which reinforces the fears in this regard.
Projects have been renewed according to this formula, which prompts state-owned commercial and service real estate investors to object to the transfer of their projects from Finance Ministry to the Public Authority for Partnership between the public and private sectors in court and request reciprocity, unless their conditions are addressed in accordance with the law on which the contract are based.
The sources added that there are also concerns about the extent of the safety of the “higher committee for partnership” to issue such a decision before issuing a decree to form it, but other sources reported that the committee does not need a new decree, given that its decree was issued based on the characteristics of its members and not their names.
On a related level, MP Saud Bouslaib has addressed a parliamentary question to the Minister of Finance in which he asked about the contradictions between the Partnership Authority Law and State Property Law No. 105/80, and how to resolve the entanglement between the Partnership Authority Law and the State Property Law.
