We plan to bring public and private sectors to facilitate infrastructure investment in Nigeria

In this interview with Businessday’s Lolade Akinmurele, Olukayode Fabunmi the Managing partner of NPPPC speaks on the firm’s upcoming conference. Excerpts

Can we meet you sir?

My name is Bar. Olukayode fabunmi ,I am the managing Partner of Business law Academy and the Country Director of Nigeria public private partnership Conference[NPPPC]

What is NPPPC all about?

NPPPC is an international investment promotion conference where we plan to bring both public and private sectors together to facilitate infrastructure investment development in Nigeria

Also we intend to launch a Nigeria public private partnership capacity building fund.

We also plan to present Nigeria PPP which will be a directory for all PPP projects in Nigeria

Which will give access to all investors on PPP projects in Nigeria that will enable them to know what is happening in Nigeria in partnership with Federal or state Government. It gives the potential investors the opportunities to access PPP activities in Nigeria.

We also plan to have business opportunities investment match making’s meeting where we have targeted networking opportunities for the private sectors decision makers and investors

What is going to be the benefit of NPPPC to the participants?                                                               

They are in two folds, firstly, it is going to be an information dissemination conference such that what is going in both the Federal and State level is disclosed directly to the interested parties and the public at large.

Secondly, it will be an opportunity to have targeted business networking, for instance  where an investor in China ,Brazil, South Africa, USA and so on. They will have direct link or access to the key Government officials e.g an investor in China will easily have access to the government in nigeria .It is going to be a bridge builder between the investors and the government.

Also it is a platform for government to meet with the interested investors as against the private investor sending what they have to offer now, it is the government that will the one to showcase their investment opportunities.

Where are the participant and the resource persons drawn from?

Primarily, they are going to be from the government because the conference is private public investment promotion conference and we want public sectors officials to come talk about their investment opportunities in terms of the investment support that they can give to the potential investors. We have invited the President, the senate president ,various state house of assembly speakers ,various head of PPP units at state levels, strategic public sector officials.

When and where is the conference coming up?

The conference is coming up on the 15^th and 16^th march 2016, at Transcorp Hilton hotel, in Abuja

To what extent do you think NPPPC will positively affect Nigeria economy?

In every economy, the most important thing is infrastructure and that is why we place emphasis on infrastructure.

As we know that Nigeria has insufficient supply of infrastructure and that is why we are not where we supposed to be economically. What the conference seems to do  is to see how these infrastructure can be provided and that is why the emphasis is on infrastructures  delivery and once infrastructure is delivered ,then things will start happening .for instance , the Lekki Epe corridor, over the last ten years ,the amount of business activities that have taken place in that area is unprecedented .As a  matter of fact, one report suggested that it is one of the fastest growing residential axis in the world and this is necessitated by the road construction and if look beyond the bad road s ,you will find out that there is economy slowdown up to where the road is dualised where there is massive investment in real estate ,business and all  that.

Really there is a short supply of funds on the part of government but when the private sectors partner with the government , it makes infrastructure delivery to be accelerated and this is the focus of the conference ,that is getting the private sectors involved in infrastructure delivery

How can the conference help Nigeria economy considering the economy meltdown?

The first thing to know is that PPP is a global market and investors go to where the opportunities are. for instance if you look at Africa ,investors will look at South Africa and East Africa and West Africa, look at Nigeria and ask questions like what and where are the projects opportunities. And once we can start to talk about what we are doing, people will start listening and that is the essence of the conference. NPPPC is endorsed and it is in collaboration with the International project finance Association which is the foremost global acquisition for PPP in the world.

Once we can start talk about our country opportunities, people will start to appreciate us. We need to get this kind of initiatives out that will start to talk about Nigeria. Once NPPPC is successful, the focus now will be Nigeria economy for would- be investors. Also it must be said that the economic meltdown in Nigeria is domestic while the market for PPP is global ,so irrespective of the circumstances of our economy ,the market will respond and the condition of the economy will not stop or deter prospective investor in Nigeria

Who are the exhibitors for NPPPC?

What we have done is to cut off the private exhibitors while focusing on the public sectors exhibitors.

So we have invited all the 36 state for participation that those who feel they have opportunities to showcase can come on board and I think we hardly have initiatives like this overtime.

Who are the resource persons to expect in NPPPC?

We have extended invitation President and some of the Ministers particularly the minister for power work and housing, and the health minister, state governors.

We also gave the private personalities opportunity to serve as moderators by asking relevant questions from the government representatives.

Where are you expecting invitation from?

We have extended invitations to both local and foreign investors .locally, we have investors who have shown interest and internationally , we have people from Brazil, USA, South Africa, UAE, UK, China, Turkey and so on  and we look forward to have more strategic interest around the world.