The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

and NATARIO McKENZIE

Tribune Business Reporter

The Government’s advisers will today announce that the bidding field for the Bahamas Electricity Corporation (BEC) restructuring has been narrowed further, although no winners have yet been selected.

Tribune Business sources close to the process disclosed that no ‘preferred bidder(s)’ for BEC’s generation and transmission and distribution (T&D) businesses have been selected, nor no contracts agreed with the Government.

Their comments came after multiple sources suggested to this newspaper that “the Chinese”, meaning China State Construction, had been chosen as the preferred bidder for the generation contract, while Carolinas-based Power Secure International had been selected as the T&D winner.

“We were told that Power Secure had got the contract,” one source told Tribune Business.

However, highly-placed contacts in the Christie administration said this was inaccurate, and that the Government had not selected preferred bidders in wrapping up the latest stage of what has already been a year-long BEC reform process.

“It’s not decided who the bidders are going to be,” said one source, adding that the field had been whittled down from the previous five contenders to an as-yet undisclosed number.

“It’s not five any more,” they added. “It’s not two either. There’s still a level of competition.

“They’re very close. They’ve [the Government] just narrowed it down. The bidders are going to undertake site visits, and then both sides will look to finalise contracts.”

It thus appears likely that the field has been narrowed to three bidders, including China State Construction and PowerSecure.

The latter was the only pure T&D bidder left among the five in an exercise that still appears to be eyeing the ‘break up’ or separation of BEC’s generation and T&D assets.

Apart from China State Construction, the remaining generation bidders in the five included Caribbean Power Partners, the US consortium headed by Texan, Taylor Cheek; Cayman-based Inter-Energy; and, possibly, Genting.

Tribune Business understands that a public statement will likely be issued on progress in the BEC reform process today, once the Government and its advisers, KPMG, meet with the Corporation’s unions to update them.

BEC union leaders yesterday said they expect to receive “official word” today on the latest developments.

Clinton Minnis, the Bahamas Electrical Utility Managerial Union’s (BEMU) president, told Tribune Business that while there were rumours and inconsistent reports surrounding the BEC restructuring process, his union was expected to meet with the Government and KPMG this morning.

“We have a meeting with the Government and their advisors, KPMG. We expect to hear the official word tomorrow. We should be in a position to speak more fully on the issue after that,” said Mr Minnis.

“We heard rumours but there have been some inconsistencies that give me some reservations. We need to hear the official word on where the process is at.”

Last August, Prime Minister Perry Christie announced the Government’s plans to effectively split BEC in two, by allowing one company to run the transmission, distribution and customer billing, while another company would offer power generation.

The process leading up to the Government’s decision over BEC’s part-privatisation, and wider energy reform, has been highly criticised by the Opposition, and some in the business community, who have urged that it be speeded up.

It was initially proposed that the Government would select the preferred bidders in the process by November 2013, undertake contract negotiations in November/December and execute contracts by January this year.

The process, however, is now at least eight months behind, especially given that the transition to private control was supposed to have taken place in May 2014. That is now unlikely to happen until year-end at earliest.