Challenges of implementing infrastructure megaprojects through public-private partnerships in Nigeria : a case study of road infrastructure

Nigeria's infrastructure deficit, especially in transport sector is appalling. This triggered the Lagos state government to start addressing its infrastructure deficit through PPPs. The purpose of this paper is to identify the challenges at both development phase and implementation (construction) phase of PPP road infrastructure megaproject, and identify the critical success factors that actually made the project successful. The paper adopted case study approach within a mixed method paradigm employed to collect data. Semi structured interviews were used to collect data from the participants involved in the case study with a view to identifying the challenges and success factors. The identified challenges and success factors were incorporated into the questionnaire survey administered to the participants involved in the development and implementation stages of the case study. Data collected were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. The results of the Relative Significant Index ranking indicate that perceptions of Nigeria as a high risk economy by foreign investors, bureaucratic nature of the state government, schedule delay by administrative procedures, threat of expropriation and reluctance to tender/bid, and public/political opposition are the most highly ranked challenges experienced at development phase. The paper further identified unexpected increased quantity, bottleneck in securing execution of the federal government support agreement, resistance by residents, and problem of access to the right-of-way as the most ranked challenges witnessed at implementation (construction) phase. The results of factor analysis identified seven challenges at development phase and four challenges at implementation phase. The paper further identified four critical success factors using factor analysis that made the PPP project successful. These include enabling legislation with due diligence, strong commitment of both public and private sectors, strong financial package, and enabling environment and allocation of risk