The Port of São Tomé workers’ union on Tuesday contested an agreement allegedly signed by the government that gives an “exclusive right” to a French company to operate services at the port for five years.
“We, the Enaport workers, have once again been confronted with the problem of the company’s concession and without being seen or heard […], once again the Enaport workers feel aggrieved, this is the second time the government has done this without informing the union,” the union’s president, Hermes Carvalho, told media.
The aforementioned “public-private partnership agreement”, was signed on December 20 between the government, represented by the Minister of Infrastructure, Natural Resources and Environment, Adelino Cardoso, the director of the National Port Administration Company (Enaport), Hamilton de Sousa, and the representative of the company Africa Global Logistics (AGL) Pierre-François Pioriou.
According to the document, AGL, a simplified joint stock company registered in France, “enters into this agreement only as a shareholder of the operating company”, which will be “incorporated under the laws of São Tomé and Príncipe, whose registered office will be in São Tomé”.
The partnership provides that during the term of the agreement “the operator will have the exclusive right to provide services at the terminal”, which includes “the quay, the yard and the equipment for the purpose of providing services at the port”. The agreement is signed “for a period of five years” and can be renewed for the same period or another, according to the will of the parties.
“The authority [Enaport] grants the operator, from the date on which all the conditions precedent have been met and for the term, the exclusive right of use in the assets of the authority […] together with all the rights and easements that belong to it for the purpose of implementing and executing the project,” the document reads.