Port of Chancay: Executive decides to take the longest route to resolve controversy

In November 2023, the National Port Authority (APN), aware of the legal vacuum to give exclusivity to Cosco Shipping of the intermediate services that the Chancay megaport, worked and presented a bill to provide the relevant legal framework. This PL, according to sources close to the project, was sent to the archive by the governing body, the Ministry of Transport and Communications (MTC).

In the last hours, the APN, in a press conference, denied that the legislative initiative sent to the MTC was intended to favor Cosco Shipping. “This rule does not have its own name. This standard was created not only for Chancay, but for all investment modalities that occur under an administrative process,” said Milagros Miguel, head of the Legal Advisory Unit of the APN.

To replace the archived PL, the APN is working on a new legal framework that would allow the company, whose main shareholder is the Chinese State, to once again request exclusivity for essential services in the port of Chancay.

According to the sources consulted, It is striking that the same formula is insisted upon which had already been raised in 2023, when basically the only thing it would seek to resolve is to regularize administrative failures.

“The position of the MTC, after three years of granting authorization for the project (the contract was signed in May 2021), is not ideal as a message to the investment climate,” questioned the source.

And this is evident in the recent statements of Carlos Tejada, deputy general manager at Cosco Shipping Ports Chancay Perú, who before the special commission to monitor the project in Congress indicated that the company would be evaluating not continuing with investments in the Chancay megaport. after the completion of its first stage of US$1.3 billiondue to controversy.

“The company received all the guarantees from the Peruvian State when it signed the authorization to build the port with purely private capital, which it will then manage to turn the country into a global hub,” said Tejada.

In this regard, the Board of Directors of the Peruvian Chinese Chamber of Commerce (CAPECHI) expressed its deep concern about the demand presented by the National Port Authority (APN) through the Ministry of Transportation and Communications to revoke the exclusivity of Cosco Shipping Ports Chancay Perú SA

CAPECHI recalled that on February 10, 2021, the APN issued Resolution 008-2021-APN-DIR through which, among other provisions, exclusivity is granted to the company for the development of the port of Chancay; “resolution that the current directive of “the APN intends to ignore it after more than three years.”