The recent financing for AES Sonel's 216MW Eu263 million ($350 million) independent gas power project in Cameroon is most noteworthy for a ground-breaking World Bank guarantee that ensured a pool of local banks could provide long-term local currency financing.
The guarantee is a template that could be rolled out for other infrastructure projects in the region that want to draw on liquid local funding sources, at a time when international project lender appetite is again under pressure. The lengthy journey of the project to financial close involved a series of hurdles that would have tripped up a less determined group, and as the second independent power project to close in Cameroon, after the Eu66 million Dibamba power plant in May 2011, it builds on a track record of successful projects in the region.
Kribi is most remarkable in that a cohort of local lenders, led by Standard Chartereds Cameroonian operation...
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