Uganda and Libya on Friday signed an agreement transferring 49% stake in the National Housing and Construction corporation (NHCC) to the Libyan Arab Foreign Investment company (LAFICO), write Alfred Wasike and Mikaili Sseppuya.
Acting finance minister Mwesigwa Rukutana and Hamed El Houderi, the LAFICO general manager (participation department), signed for Uganda and the Libyan government respectively, at the finance ministry boardroom in Kampala.
Libya has appointed LAFICO as its agent. The agreement finalised successful negotiations for a debt for equity swap between the two countries in which Libya agreed to cancel the interest and penalties on Uganda’s debt amounting to US$88m (sh162.8b) of a US$184m (sh340.4b) debt.
The minority shareholding LAFICO has taken over is worth US$20.3m (sh37.5b) and followed the Privatisation Unit (PU) Statute, under which the Government of Uganda retains the majority shares in NHCC. Present at the signing were the acting deputy Secretary to the Treasury, Keith Muhakanizi, the Libyan ambassador, the director general of LAFICO, Ahmed Amaer, the director of PU, Michael Opagi and Charles Odere of Lex Associates.
President Yoweri Museveni recently visited Libya on his way from attending the 60th United Nations Summit in New York. Cabinet recently approved the deal in which Libya acquired the shares in the parastatal as part of the deal for Uganda to pay off its loans.
Source: New Vision
