Malaysia private sector to imitate Saudi Arabia

Chief Secretary to the Government Datuk Seri Dr Ali Hamsa, said the private sector in Malaysia could emulate the Shuaibah Independent Water and Power Project (IWPP) in southern Jeddah, which has proven a success.

He said, the IWPP, which is a Tenaga Nasional Berhad (TNB), Malakoff Corporation Berhad (Malakoff) and Khazanah Nasional Berhad joint-venture project with private entity in southern Jeddah, Saudi Arabia also showed that Malaysians had the ability to further engage with international companies.

“The sectors which are interested to get involved in such projects need to build on this, sell more of the experience and duplicate more of such projects. I congratulate both countries and companies on this successful partnership,” he said during his visit to the plant, located 120km south of here.

Ali is on a four-day working visit to Saudi Arabia.

Shuaibah IWPP, of which the actual project costs below USD$2.3bil (RM6.9bil), consists of two entities, Shuaibah Water and Electricity Company which owns the main IWPP plants and Shuaibah Expansion Project Company (SEPCO) which owns the expansion water plant project.

Its concession period is 20 years. Nett combined capacity of the IWPP Shuaibah complex is 900MW and 1,030,000 m3 per day, which account for about 16 percent of water demand in the kingdom, particularly the Holy City of Mecca, Jeddah, Taif and Al Baha.

The ownership structure for Shuaibah IWPP, which is the biggest IWPP (water plant) in the world, comprises Malaysian and Saudi Arabian private investors as well as quasi-government entities from both countries.

The Saudi Arabian and Malaysian corporate sponsors are Acwa Power, TNB (as technical investor), Malakoff and Khazanah and each has 50 percent indirect shareholding in the bidder company, which is Saudi Malaysia Water and Electricity Company Limited (Samawec).

Samawec owns 60 percent of the project companies and the remaining 40 percent are owned by Water and Electricity Holding Company (WEHCO), Kingdom of Saudi Arabia at 32 percent and by Saudi Electricity Company at eight per cent.

Shuaibah board chairman Dr Yahya Al-Yahya said the company had started distributing dividends to its shareholders and had attained a considerable achievement since commercial operations began in 2009.

“We have surpassed all power and water production commitments except this year, which is slightly below due to planned extended power outage,” he said.