Having met all financial obligations and counterpart funding commitments between June 2012 and February 2013, all is now set for the establishment of a $12 million Sodium Hypochlorite Plant in kaduna by Wattccon Group Nigeria ltd in partnership with General Electric, USA.
The Plant which would occupy a 2.6 hectare industrial land along the Kaduna airport road, would begin full operation by the first quarter of 2014, according to the Chairman of the group, Khadir Abba Dasuki.
Briefing shareholders during the Annual General Meeting and product launch organized by the Group at Hotel 17 in Kaduna at the weekend, Dasuki said Wattccon met “its counterpart funding commitment for the purchase and installation of a 40,000 liters per day General Electric, USA, Cloromat technology based Sodium Hypochlorite Chemical plant.”
He told the shareholders among who were former Minister of State for Defence, Murtala Shehu Yar’Adua, the Group Managing Director, ABG Communications, Mohammed Bawa, the former Chairman Lagos State Sports Council, Yomi Dada and Shamsudeen Mohammed Bello that the plant is a “$12 million total investment financed by a US Exim five year medium term guaranteed loan.”
“Obligor guarantee and bridging financing was provided by Fidelity Bank plc, the project’s local financing partners,” he added.
Dasuki further told the shareholders that the project was a dream come true after nearly a decade untiring efforts of the Managing Director of Wattccon, Aliyu Maigari Mamman, the former chairman of the Group, Murtala S Yar’ Adua and other Directors of the Group.
He announced that when fully operational, the plant would create over fifty direct skilled jobs and 200 indirect jobs for Nigerians.
His words:’’ The GE-Cloromat membrane technology is the world’s most environmentally friendly process of manufacturing chlorine bleach chemical currently the most acceptable alternative to hazardous chlorine gas and chlorine HTH powder used for water disinfection and bleach manufacturing.”
“The Wattccon plant will be the 51st GE Cloromat plant in the world and the first of its kind in the West African sub-region. The only plant like this is in Durban, South Africa,” he said.
When operational, Watccon’s sodium Hypo plant will serve Nigeria and other West Africa countries’ needs for portable and waste water treatment plants disinfection chemicals and also provide bleach manufacturing with their active ingredients for household bleach. The final engineering design of the plant will be concluded in April 2013 by Projects Assignment limited of South Africa. The local mechanical and electrical engineering consultants are Gams and Abel Nigeria Limited. The construction of the plant will be completed in December 2013, for commercial delivery to start by Q1-2014.
“The key raw materials are water (90 tons per day), industrial salt (10 tons per day) and electricity (10,000kwhr per day),” Alhaji Dasuki stated.
He expressed appreciation of Wattccon group to all its partners, saying that it was a milestone achievement “as part of our contribution to the water disinfection industry in particular where over 300 million people of Nigeria and neighbouring West African countries will benefit from this pioneering technology in collaboration with General Electric USA, US Exim Bank and Fidelity Bank plc”.
BLESSING OLAIFA, Kaduna
