By Ademola Alawiye

Tuesday, 4 Jan 2011

 

United Bank for Africa Plc has said that it is collaborating with Company for the Development of Renewable Energy and Gabon‘s Ministry of Energy in the construction of a 36megawatt hydro-power generating plant in the Central African nation.

A statement by the bank on Monday said, the partnership would be done through the bank‘s subsidiaries – UBA Gabon and UBA Capital (Africa), the investment banking arm of UBA Group.

The statement added that the plant would be built on the FE 2 Dam, at the river Okano in the northern part of the country.

It said, ”The 36MW hydro power project and a sister project at Imperatrice Dam, also a Coder project, are expected to stimulate economic activity in the oil rich Gabon and help towards poverty alleviation. It is part of a 30-year concession package on electricity generation, negotiated by CODER with Gabonese government in May 2010.

”The participation of UBA group in the projects is in furtherance of the group‘s infrastructural development initiatives across Africa and in line with its increasing involvement in big project financing and advisory services across the continent. The electricity projects estimated to cost about $234m has a completion time of 30 months.”

The Chief Executive Officer, UBA Africa, Mr. Rasheed Olaoluwa, said the bank‘s participation in the projects came on the heels of a recent conferment of financial institutions Gold Award on UBA by Africa Import and Export Bank for its role in financing and expanding inter African trade and project financing.

Olaoluwa said that the involvement of UBA Gabon in this project underscored the increasingly important roles being played by UBA Group and its subsidiaries in funding infrastructure development on the continent.

”We are adequately positioned to support private and public institutions to activate growth and development in Africa, whether in infrastructure finance, trade expansion or financial advisory services,” Olaoluwa added.

Source: Punch