THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan will convene an all-party meeting in Thiruvananthapuram on November 25 to drum up political support for the Vizhinjam International Container Transshipment Terminal (ICTT) project.
Ports Minister M. Vijayakumar and other Ministers on the board of the Vizhinjam International Seaport Ltd (VISL), Opposition Leader Oommen Chandy, Deputy Opposition Leader G. Karthikeyan, MPs and MLAs from the district, one representative each from all political parties and panchayat officials will be present at the meeting.
Global tenders are to be floated for the multi-crore project a third time.
The LDF Government had recently appointed International Finance Corporation (IFC), a World Bank Group firm, to conduct techno-economic feasibility studies afresh. This is the second time in the project’s history that an all-party meeting is to be convened.
Meantime, the State Government is going all out to give the Port project a boost in the recession-hit world market. On November 17 and 18, the project was showcased at a conference organised by Port Finance International (PFI) at Westminster, London. IFC representatives made a presentation on the Port.
“We are trying to generate interest in the Port,’’ said Ports Secretary Sanjeev Kaushik, who attended the two-day conference attended by big names in the ports industry. PFi is an online newsportal for the world ports finance and investment markets.
The last occasion an all-party meeting was convened, it was to urge the Centre to provide security clearance to a consortium of two Chinese companies and Mumbai-based Zoom Developers. Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan and Opposition Leader Oommen Chandy had subsequently led a delegation to New Delhi. But the attempt had failed. Later, the LDF and the UDF had fallen out over the denial of contract to Zoom Developers after global tenders were floated the second time.
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