Vehicles travel on an expressway. Investors eligible to execute the North-South Expressway’s component projects under the PPP format have to be financially capable, have previous experience and propose the lowest amount of State funding - PHOTO: VNA

To assess investors, the ministry will apply a method related to the State capital contribution to the projects, which means that investors who tap the smallest amount of State funding to develop the projects will be preferred, said Bui Quang Thai, deputy head of the ministry’s PPP Department, reported Nguoi Lao Dong newspaper.

After some 20 days of bidding forms being issued, the project management units under the ministry have sold 14 applications to investors who passed the first preliminary qualification round for five component projects of the expressway—the National Highway 45-Nghi Son, Nghi Son-Dien Chau, Dien Chau-Bai Vot, Nha Trang-Cam Lam and Cam Lam-Vinh Hao.

After buying the bidding forms, investors will have 60 days to prepare and submit the bidding documents. The open bidding is set for September 20, after which the bidding documents will be evaluated, according to Thai.

The ministry will negotiate and sign contracts with winning bidders in December this year to break ground for these components in early 2021 and put them into operation in 2023, the official added.

Although participating investors already had their experience and capacity assessed in the preliminary qualification round, the ministry will keep reviewing the qualifications of investors through further bidding rounds.

In the bidding invitations, the ministry specified that the winning bidders will have six months to mobilize credit capital starting from the date they signed the contracts and will cancel the contracts and confiscate the contract guarantee if the investors fail to seek bank loans by the deadline.

The guarantee is equivalent to 1-3% of the contract’s value as regulated in the Law on Bidding. These requirements are in line with the Government’s Resolution 20/2018 aimed at addressing the inadequacies of previous build-operate-transfer projects and ensuring the projects will be implemented as scheduled and that only qualified investors participate in them. SGT

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