The Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) has disclosed that the present Marina car parks in Lagos would be transformed into Quayside structure through a Public Private Partnership (PPP) arrangement.
Chidi Izuwah, the commission director-general, made this known while addressing newsmen in Lagos on Thursday after inspecting the proposed project site.
Izuwah explained that the Quayside project which would be fully financed by private investors would start from the Leventis axis down to the end of Marina axis.
Marina Quayside project is an unsolicited proposal submitted to the Federal Ministry of Power, Works and Housing by Harris AIB Associates Ltd, a Lagos based firm of architects and developers.
Izuwah told journalists that the development would support the rebalancing the economy of Lagos State because it is the commercial capital of the country.
“It will promote the growth of private sector employment from retail and leisure to high skilled occupations in creative, corporate, retail, digital industries and financial services.
“It is a transformative urban and water-front development project intended to be a tourist centre that will provide hotels, condominiums, commercial complexes among many other facilities in the country
“If you go to most devoloped cities in the world, water front are very valuable which is a huge commercial investment, when you go to London, when you go to Sydney, Maryland just to mention.
“Waterfront are valuable piece of land which is developed for commercial and housing purposes creating employment and revenue to the economic units.
“So there is what is called unsolicited proposal from a private component to develop what is called Marina Quayside project. This is what we called a privately initiated infrastructure proposal,” he said.
Izuwah said the commission was at the site to access the proposed project site to ensure adequate regulatory framework was put into the project.
According to him, we have come to see what the commission needs to do to realise this project from the point of view of concession and partnering with the private sector
The director general said thr commission would protect the interest of the federal, Lagos state government, the private investors and other stakeholders that we could collectively work together for the actualisation of it.
Izuwah stated that the present value of the land was not in commensurate with what the land was being used for.
“If we look at the car parks here, the value of the land and the value of what it is being used for then you will know that the full value of this waterfront is not being realise.
“So the only way we can fully realise it is to develop it into a major development just as we have it in other part of the world,” he said.
Izuwah noted that the benefits to Nigerians was that there would be more housing, commercial areas, shopping malls, waterfront centres, and this would further create about two million jobs.
He said Nigerians travelled Dubai, South Africa, and other parts of the world to enjoy themselves adding that this project would make other countries to also come to Marina Quayside to enjoy themselves as well.
According to him, this is about economic development for Lagos and do not forget that the commercial capital of Nigeria is Lagos and the commercial capital of Lagos is in Marina.
Izuwah also noted that the project would create an intermodal means of transportation and business for Lagosians.
He said there was no exact date for the project to commence the commission was here to define how it could design a world-‘class project.
