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China Unicom Denies Involvement In Nitel Bid
Publish Date : 19-Feb-2010
In a curious twist, China Unicom (Hong Kong) Ltd, previously named a member of the New Generation Consortium that emerged the preferred bidder for 75 per cent stake in moribund Nigerian Telecommuni-cations Limited (NITEL) with a $2.5bn bid, has denied knowledge of the deal. A report said China Unicom dissociated itself from the bid for NITEL announced by the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE). Also, Deputy General Manager Corporate Commun-ications of the company, in an email enquiry from Thisday claimed ignorance of the deal. BPE had announced that GiCell Wireless Limited of Nigeria, China Unicom and Minerva Group of United Arab Emirate (UAE) were members of New Generation Consortium.
The company in a press statement signed by Gumi explained that the financial backbone of the New Generation Consortium is the Minerva Group of United Arab Emirates. Gumi further stated that, the consortium has several other strategic partners with whom New Generation Consortium Limited has signed Memor-andum of Understanding, including GIT Affinalia in association with Ring South Europa, Spain, and Xtra Telecom/Phone House Group, FiberHomes technologies, Huawei Technologies Limited, Oper-ators of the National Rural Telephony Program in Nigeria and China Academy of Telecommunic-ations Techn-ology.
A letter from China Unicom (Europe) Operations Limited titled “Re: Privatisation of Nigeria Telecommunications Plc,” and signed by its President, William So, reads: \"We are pleased to inform you that we are willing to be technical partner to support New Generation Telecommunic-ations Limited Consortium to bid for NITEL and to provide technical and managerial support on terms to be agreed later, when the bid is finally won. We will also consider equity participation of not less than 20 percent subject to final agreement with the consortium.
The result of the financial bid, which was publicised by Anichebe, also showed that Omen International emerged the reserved bidder with a bid of $956 million. China Unicom (Hong Kong) Limited (formerly known as \"China Unicom Limited\") was incorporated in Hong Kong in February 2000 and was listed on the New York Stock Exchange and the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong on June 21 2000 and June 22, 2000 respectively.
