The government has issued a new request for proposals from bidders for a logistics hub in Ħal Far – but with no changes made to the first call which closed on January 13.

The Ministry for the Economy has steadfastly refused to confirm why the original call issued in October had flopped, but various sources told the Times of Malta that there were no bidders for the international call, describing it as “a huge embarrassment” for the government.

The RFP issued last October through the Privatisation Unit said the eventual operator would be given a non-renewable 65-year lease of the 45,000-square-metre site to be used as either a Customs-free zone or a Customs warehouse. The bidders must pay a €10,000 submission fee. The bid bond would be €350,000.

Applicants were originally given until January 13, 2017 to submit their proposals. The closing date for the new RFP is April 3.

Interested parties would have three years in which to construct the hub

Interested parties would have three years in which to construct the hub – creating a maximum 1.4 million-cubic-metre warehouse – on the site presently being used as a Customs groupage complex. There are currently 34 operators working from the Ħal Far groupage complex who were assured last October by Economics Minister Chris Cardona that their operations would remain unaltered.

The government wants to introduce logistics activity to Malta and the RFP said that the idea was not to shift existing operations to the new site, but rather to attract new activity.