By Fatou Sillah
The Minister of Transport, Works, and Infrastructure, Ebrima Sillah, told lawmakers on Wednesday that delays affecting the planned port project with Albayrak Group stem from unresolved land access issues and the government’s inability to begin key technical studies on schedule.
Appearing before the National Assembly of The Gambia, Mr. Sillah said the government had not been able to provide a formal land lease for the proposed site in Sanyang, a step he said was necessary for the concessionaire to begin essential preparatory work, including geotechnical and environmental studies.
Without a clear legal title to the land, he said, contractors were unwilling to proceed.
“No contractor of this magnitude will take the risk to go and start investing in a land that, you know, the ownership is not clear,” Mr. Sillah told lawmakers.
The delays, he said, also affected access to proposed logistics platforms in Kaur and Basse, which were intended to support the broader port development plan. The lack of access forced the government and the concessionaire to renegotiate parts of the agreement and extend the timeline for completing the required studies.
Mr. Sillah acknowledged that the setbacks were largely attributable to the government’s side of the arrangement.
“As a result of the issues I have mentioned, other challenges were triggered on the part of the concessionaire,” he said. “By this time, the studies should have started, and as a result, we missed those timelines.”
The minister also dismissed suggestions that the project had become controversial amid public criticism, arguing that the debate reflected misunderstanding rather than substantive problems.
“As far as I am concerned, there is no controversy,” he said. “I think there is a severe lack of understanding, and this needs to be properly explained in context.”
Asked about a revised schedule for the project, Mr. Sillah said the government had now assigned the land lease to the Gambia Ports Authority, giving the concessionaire nearly a year to carry out the necessary studies before construction could begin.
“We have almost one year now to do all the necessary studies,” he said.
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