JULY 2000 marks the date for the hand-over of the currently para-statal port of Maputo in Mozambique to a private sector consortium.
November 17 saw the signing of the final agreement in the Mozambique capital - some 18 long months since the decision to go private was given the green light and the provisional agreement signed with the state-run railway
and ports body, Portos e Caminhos de Ferro de Mozambique (CFM).
The consortium - including Mersey Docks and Harbour Company of the UK, Liscont of Portugal, Skanska BOT Projects of Sweden and Mozambique Gestores - is reported to have budgeted US$50-million for renovating and upgrading the port.
This final run-in to private operation has been greeted with support from a number of SA companies - especially those on the Reef which have been looking for a viable, but closer, alternative to the SA ports (mostly Durban and Richards Bay) for seafreight traffic.
The only question remaining is what is to happen about the promised rail access along the Maputo Corridor - where Spoornet and CFM have come to blows over the supposed joint-venture between the two rail operators on the Gauteng-Mpumalanga-Maputo route.
But, said one specialist in Mozambique affairs, it could certainly put the brakes on the development of the mainly-bulk port at Porta Dobela (some 60 kilometres south
of Maputo) - a proposed US$515-million project.
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