This week was scheduled for Jakarta, Indonesia to kickstart the assignment for the Ministry of Finance’s PPP Unit. I used Emirates this time because the direct flights from KLM and Garuda were excessively priced presumably because of the holiday season. I arrived on Sunday and checked into the Hotel Borobudor, next to the Ministry of Finance. Jakarta was extensively in the news because of the floods. I even received a safety check request from Facebook. Maybe I should not have responded I was safe because it alarmed my worrying mother. Anyhow, the downtown area where I was, was hardly touched by the floods.
The assignment concerns the development of model tender documents for PPPs in 6 priority sectors including water, waste, urban transport, health, housing and gas distribution. The overall development of PPP has been slow in Indonesia despite the urgent need for infrastructure improvements throughout the country. The government has recognised this and has initiated a program to accelerate the development of PPP with support from among others the World Bank. This includes among others capacity building through the CP3P program that has brought me already several times to Indonesia and the development of operational guidelines for the development and implementation of PPP projects with specific focus on the 6 priority sectors. These guidelines are to include templates for tender documents i.e. Request for Qualification, Request for Proposal and PPP Agreements for which purpose I have been retained along with a local legal expert. The rationale for these templates is to ensure that the tender documents for prospective PPP projects are in accordance with international best practices and the relevant Indonesian regulations in order to ensure efficient and effective PPP tenders.
As is often the case, the first activity is to prepare an inception report. A report that sets forth the work plan based on the contractually agreed terms of reference for the scope of work and the initial understanding of the situation on the ground. For this purpose I, together with my local partner Miss Arisia Pusponegoro, discussed the project extensively with my client at the PPP Unit, Mr. Agung Tehuh Nugoho, in terms of its background, expectations and challenges. We also had meetings with some relevant stakeholders including the Procurement Agency, the Indonesia Infrastructure Guarantee Fund and SMI, the Infrastructure Finance Agency. Constructive meetings ensuring buy-in from the stakeholders and close cooperation for the implementation of the assignment. It was good to see so many familiar faces from the trainings I had delivered in Indonesia in 2018 and 2019. All in all relevant information was gathered and it was agreed that the inception report would be submitted by the end of next week.
Another relevant activity concerned a conference call with Dubai to discuss my possible involvement in the so called Government Excellence Program, a Performance Measurement approach for government entities that requires periodic independent assessment from subject matter experts. I would focus on reviewing for a selected number of government entities the use of partnerships for enhancing efficiency and effectiveness of the respective service provisions by these entities. The review is scheduled for End of March and we agreed on the scope of work and the main conditions, though full agreement has yet be confirmed. Interesting and look forward to visit Dubai again.
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