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The Lease Board of the Addis Abeba City Caretaker
Administration decided last Wednesday that the 50
plots designated for the construction of hotel
complexes should be leased to investors through
tender. The Board also determined that investors
should put 15pc of their project costs in a blocked
account and finalise the project within a single
year.
“We have decided to transfer the plots through bid,”
Sherif Kerri, head of the city mayor’s office told
Fortune.
He, however, declined to make further comments
claiming that the decision has not been
ratified.
The plots will be put on the auction bloc next week
for interested investors, a source at the Lease
Board told Fortune.
A letter sent to the City Administration signed by
Berhanu Adelo, head of the PM’s Office, stipulated
that vast plots belonging to public agencies should
be identified and made available to investors to
curb the shortage of hotels in the city. Sources at
the Addis Abeba Land Development and Administration
Authority (AALDAA) told Fortune that, in
accordance with the letter, engineers of the
Authority have discerned the 50 plots.
The plots include extra spaces in the premises of
the Ministry of Mines and Energy (MoME) located off
the road from Megenagna to CMC, Quality and
Standards Authority (QSAE); the Civil Aviation
Authority on South Africa Street and the Ministry of
Agriculture and Rural Development (MoARD) in
Kazanchis.
The hotel expansion project will be undertaken in
two phases; 15 to 20 hotels in the first phase and
the balance in the second, sources disclosed. The
government focused on holdings of its agencies in
the first phase of the projects as it will not
require evictions and compensation payments.
The second phase of the project, which will be
carried out in shanty areas that need renewal,
requires compensation payments to the titleholders
of the land. An investor would be given 3,000sqm to
5,000sqm of plot as long as he has the capacity to
erect a three-star and above hotel, sources
disclosed.
The metropolis has fewer than 5,000 bedrooms in its
various hotels that are up to the required standards
where it should have 10,000, according to a study by
the Ministry of Works and Urban Development (MoWUD).
Though there are around 200 hotels in the city,
those that meet the standard are below 100.
Arkebe Oqubay, state minister of MoWUD, had told
Fortune that the government has envisaged on
alleviating the city’s stark shortage of good
quality hotels.
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