The government will be negotiating the sale of two Malta Shipyards assets with Valletta Gateway Terminals and Manoel Island Yacht Yard Consortium.

The two entities were named as preferred bidders by the Ministry of Finance yesterday for the Marsa shipbuilding facility and the Manoel Island yacht repair facility respectively.

This is another step in the privatisation of Malta Shipyards.

The government had requested bids for all of the company's assets or for each of the four separate units within.

Apart from shipbuilding and the yacht repair yard, Malta Shipyards also has the super yacht facility and the ship repair facility. The bids for the latter two functions have fallen below the government's expectations and it was reported that it had asked for new submissions.

A total of 14 submissions were received, of which three were for the ship repair facilities, five for Malta Superyachts, three for the shipbuilding facilities and three for Manoel Island Yacht Yard. The government said it had accepted the recommendations of the Privatisation Unit's evaluation committee with regard to the privatisation of the Marsa Shipbuilding and steel fabrication facility and the Manoel Island yacht repair facility.

The committee recommended that VGT be selected as the preferred bidder for the Marsa Shipbuilding facility and Manoel Island Yacht Yard Consortium, which includes Midi, for the Manoel Island yacht repair facility.

VGT handles cargo operations in the Grand Harbour and also operates the dockside facilities.

The Manoel Island Consortium includes Midi, responsible for the construction of lucrative apartments at Tignè Point and Manoel Island.

The decisions are the first to have been announced since the call for bidding for the facilities of Malta Shipyards.

The process for the privatisation of the shipyards started in the middle of last year and included an early retirement scheme taken up by almost all the workers at Malta Shipyards.