The South African subsidiary of a Portuguese civil construction company has won a two-phase, $818-million contract to construct Bugesera International Airport in Rwanda under a build-own-operate-transfer model, with a view to turning it into central Africa’s premier air transport hub by 2018.
The airport, located 25 kilometers east of Rwanda’s capital, Kigali, was designed by U.K.-based TPS Consult in partnership with Nairobi-based GIBB Africa. Mota-Engil Africa aims to complete, in 2018, the terms of the first-phase contract, which the company signed on Sept. 1. With a planned capacity of 1.7 million annual passengers, the airport will complement Kigali International Airport.