The first modernization program for Cape Verde’s airports, carried out by Vinci Airports, is expected to cost 80 million euros and the works are about to start, the company’s president announced this Wednesday, during a visit to the country.
“The construction contracts have already been awarded”, with preparation procedures taking place over a few weeks, said Nicolas Notebaert, general director of Vinci Concessions and president of Vinci Airports.
The person in charge hopes to return to Cape Verde, “during the year 2024”, to see “the physical progress of these works”.
The initial work was handed over to Portuguese construction companies, Teixeira Duarte and Alves Ribeiro, with whom Vinci has already worked in Brazil, he said.
Nicolas Notebaert was speaking at the end of a visit in which he showed the Cape Verdean President, José Maria Neves, and the Deputy Prime Minister, Olavo Correia, the plans for the country’s seven airports which, in July, were handed over to Vinci in a concession valid for 40 years.
The first tranche for the concession, worth 35 million euros, has already been paid by Vinci to the Cape Verdean State and the company also launched the first slice of investment.
“We launched the first modernization program for Cape Verde’s airports: around 75 to 80 million euros” to be invested in the seven airports and which include “very important security investments for traffic”, he said.
“Work is needed to complete the runway system, the aeronautical system and also the terminals, but also a training system, a trust system that allows Cape Verdean employees, the teams we are going to bring together, to give their best” , added the person responsible.
Nicolas Notebaert also predicted an “improvement in the quality of service at airports, both in terms of fluidity for passengers and also in terms of technology”, whether through Wi-Fi or other features.
“Cape Verde consolidates all values to make a long-term concession”, namely, “a rule of law where there is a great democracy, with legal and political stability”, he highlighted, when asked about risks for the business.
The president of VINCI Airports also guaranteed that there will be no layoffs in the structure he inherits in the country, reiterating the position that the company had already expressed in a statement, giving “welcome to the more than 300 workers at Cape Verde airports” and ensuring the its integration.
The investment plan has an environmental focus, with the inclusion of an energy production component with wind turbines at the airport on the island of Sal and with photovoltaic panels in Boa Vista and Santiago.
Vinci wants to include the Portuguese-speaking country in its “global network of airport skills”, which includes 72 airports in 25 countries, “to contribute to the development of tourism and more broadly to the development of Cape Verde”.
“The mission in Cape Verde is a mission of physical and financial investment and is also a training, social and environmental mission”, he highlighted.
The Cape Verdean Government announced the definitive handover of the public airport service concession to Cabo Verde Airports, a company under Cape Verdean law belonging to the Vinci group, on July 24, following the contract signed in 2022.
The objective is to “expand and modernize” the country’s four international airports and three airfields with an investment of 928 million euros over 40 years.
The State will receive 80 million euros and the operator will also have to pay a percentage of gross revenues annually, 2.5% in the first 20 years, rising to 7% in the last 10.
Cabo Verde Airports will be exempt from various taxes in the archipelago for 15 years.
