Filenews 25 November 2025 - by Chrysanthos Manoli
The Auditor General, Andreas Papaconstantinou, issued a critical report on Tuesday morning with many serious remarks on the handling of the Cyprus Ports Authority, regarding the procedures for awarding a contract for the construction of an anchorage and the installation of two underwater pipelines for the transport of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) in the sea port area of Vasilikos.
It is sad and worrying that in several parts of the report, the mistakes, omissions, failures and delays of the Port Authority officials refer, by analogy, to the great fiasco of the project of the construction of a liquefied natural gas (LNG) import and gasification terminal in the same area, under the responsibility of DEFA.
They had been studying it since '15 but they were wrong
The project undertaken by the Ports Authority was deemed urgent and very important for the state's energy policy since 2021, but remains unfinished today, at the end of 2025, with a significant increase in the cost initially budgeted.
The Auditor General points out in his report that the first discussions for the construction of the anchorage and the two liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) pipelines began in 2015, but the decision to implement the project was taken by the Council of Ministers on 27.10.2021, with the character of urgency.
However, the contract with a contractor was signed in June 2024, with the provision for the project to be delivered in August 2025, which has not been done. As Mr. Papaconstantinou emphasizes, "this means that only 8% of the time (10 months out of 120) was about actual implementation, while the remaining 92% of the time was about discussions and preparation." And in the end, it became clear that both the discussions and the preparation and the planning are characterized by significant failures.
As the Auditor General indicatively states, although 18 months were spent preparing the documents until the announcement of the tender, however, after the announcement there were amendments to the initial documents, with the most substantial being (a) the doubling of the duration of the contract from five to ten months and (b) the revision of the estimated cost upwards by 12.2%, just 11 days before the deadline for the submission of tenders.
"This raises questions about the whole preparation," the report points out, while also raising concerns about whether these amendments have prevented other serious economic operators from bidding. As, by analogy, it was done in 2018 with the tender for the large project of the natural gas terminal in Vasiliko, by DEFA.
Only two offers and with problems
As the Auditor General observes, the two tenders received presented serious reasons for rejection, so the tender should have been cancelled and re-announced, which did not happen. Something that, we recall, was requested in advance by the Audit Office in 2018-19 and for the LNG terminal project, without being heard.
And Mr. Papaconstantinou adds: "10 months after the start of the works and while the Project should have been completed, the payments for the executed works amounted to about 50% of the net amount of the contract. After the contractual date for the completion of the works (2.8.2025) had passed, the Cyprus Ports Authority, without securing the prior approval of the Central Committee for Changes and Requirements (KEAA), instructed the contractor to change the route of the LPG pipelines, with significant time implications looming. Therefore, the construction of the project, which had been described as critical in terms of its completion time, is evolving with an indefinite time and economic horizon"...
Like the one with the LNG terminal in Vasilikos...
The cost of the project, based on the contract, is 28.7% higher than the Initial Estimated Value and 14.7% higher than the Final Estimated Value. Failure to complete the project on time and change the route of the pipelines is expected to lead to a further increase in costs, warns the Auditor General.
And he concludes his introductory statement with the following: "Without ignoring the specifics of the project, the course of its implementation is a typical case of the state's inability to implement a substantial development project, quickly, effectively, within the prescribed timelines and within the estimated cost."
The Ports Authority responded extensively to the comments of the Audit Office and its response is set out in its entirety in Annex 3 of the report, on the Authority's website. In general, the Authority assures that it takes into account the comments and takes measures to correct procedures and review decisions on current issues and future tenders.
