Maya Tskitishvili: “The closer we get to the end of the year the harder it is for Anaklia Consortium to reach all its goals”

Maya Tskitishvili answered multiple questions regarding the Anaklia Deep Sea Port and stated that the more we approach the deadline for Anaklia Consortium to find the necessary funding, the more complicated it will become to achieve this goal.

According to the Minister, the state started the investor search because the commercial project should be implemented by the business sphere.

“Anaklia, of course, must be built. When we start talking about who should build it, why should they build it, what is going on with this project, let's separate two themes? First - I think we all agree about whether or not we need this project. There was some attempt to at least try to make it seem as if the state did not want this project. We can all agree that the state wants this project to happen.

The second topic is how to implement this project. As part of the implementation of this project, we have chosen from the beginning that the project should be built by a private investor and this is not unique to Anaklia Port,” said Tskitishvili.

The Minister of Development and Infrastructure continued to say that other large investment projects that are being built in Georgia follow the same model of being implemented by a business sphere and that's why the state started looking for an investor.

Tskitishvili thinks that as we approach the end of the year it is more challenging for Anaklia Consortium to fulfill its commitments, but the minister and the state are willing to wait. She said that back in June, the government has decided to wait till the end of the year to terminate the contract.

“We didn’t terminate the contract considering that in June we decided to push the deadline till the end of the year.

October 15 was an interim deadline, which included interim commitments that failed to be met by October 15, and in this case, the Anaklia Development Consortium has until the end of the year to meet those obligations,” noted Tskitishvili.

The minister then talked about the “Conti Group” saying that it was still unknown why the company decided to leave the project.

“What was incredibly important to us was the tender. The consortium won this tender, I assure you because they had the experience and financial resources of a company such as Conti Group. Of course, when the Conti Group leaves the project, it can be crucial to the success of the project. This is the reason why we have not yet confirmed the exit of the Conti Group to the Consortium, the exchange of these shares and why we asked the Consortium to replace the Conti Group with another Western group of the same experience, with the same reputation,” stated the minister.