The future of Anaklia Port – What does the government plan to do?
By Nika Gamtsemlidze
Monday, October 12
Many experts have said over the last few years that the Anaklia Port is one of the most important projects for the future of the country had, giving Georgia a lot of great and important opportunities. However, because of the problems that the project had, it's future seems to be very uncertain at this point.
The new budget adopted by the government gives some hope for this project, and many are saying that there are some signs for it to continue in the future. Recently, the Anaklia Development Consortium released a statement on Georgia's 2021 draft budget.
The statement says that according to the draft budget proposed for 2021, the government is questioning the success of the new tender related to the port project.
The consortium believes that no credible investor will participate in the tender amid arbitration disputes over how the government treated ADC (Anaklia Development Consortium) and foreign investor Bob Meyer.
The statement reads that the Consortium is still ready to continue working on the project, to attract more investors, so Georgia can use it at its best.
According to the draft state budget for 2021, the Georgian government will invest 10 million GEL in the development of the highway and railway project connecting the Anaklia deep-water port. According to the same project, 225 million GEL is provided for roads and railways in 2022-2024.
In January 2020, the Georgian government terminated its contract with the Anaklia Development Consortium, following an appeal by both the consortium and one of its investors, Bob Meyer, to the Arbitration Court. In the process, the parties argue that the destructive steps taken by the Georgian government have halted the implementation of one of the most important infrastructure projects for Georgia, which has caused significant financial damage to investors.
Although the budget envisages spending GEL 10 million on road construction in 2021, this is not really a guarantee that these costs will actually be utilized. In recent years, there has not been a case when as much has been spent on the development of this road as was planned in the budget.
For example, in 2019, 11 million was initially planned to be spent, but in fact the development amounted to 3.7 million GEL. According to the initial draft of the 2020 budget, 50 million was envisaged for the construction of the road, which was further reduced to 3.3 million GEL.
