"Fishy" Road Contracts Terminated

THE Ministry of Roads and Highways has terminated road contracts awarded on January 5 this year, two days before the new government assumed office.

The sector Minister, Mr Kwadwo Adjei-Darko, who announced this at Twifo Praso, said the ministry took the action because it “suspected something fishy about the award of the contracts”.

The minister announced this on Wednesday when he inspected some roads in the Twifo-Heman-Lower Denkyira and Assin districts of the Central Region as part of his three day tour of the region.

The projects include the last 10 kilometre of the 30 km Twifo Praso-Dunkwa On-Offin road being undertaken by K. E. and Sons Limited at the cost of ?27 billion.

Mr Adjei-Darko said other projects to be affected by the termination order are the Bole-Bamboe and Bawdie-Asankragua roads.

The minister said the companies undertaking the projects would be given letters to stop work on these projects as early as possible.

He said the ministry has already terminated 10 contracts in the Shama-Ahanta East Metropolitan Area because there was no proof that the assembly members approved the award of the contracts.

Mr Adjei-Darko said investigations by the ministry have revealed that most of the companies undertaking the contracts did not go through the competitive bidding process while the cost of the contracts are very high.

He said “ if the companies went through the competitive bidding process, government would not pay even a third of what the companies are charging”.

He said the contracts would be repackaged for competitive bidding, adding that, "with that process in place the ministry can get value for money.

He said the contractors undertaking the projects can also bid for the contracts, and explained that “ if they do not win the contracts they would be compensated for work done so far”.

Mr Adjei-Darko noted that the government has not only inherited debts but a chaotic situation in the award of contracts and said the ministry would need to be more vigilant to ensure sanity in the award of contracts.

The Project Engineer of K. E. and Sons, Mr P.K. Asante, said the first and second phases of the project were completed at the cost of ?9 billion and ?11 billion in 1996 and 2000 respectively.

He explained that the cost of the third phase is ?27 billion because of variations in work and the inflationary trends in the country.

The minister also met other interest groups in the road industry at Assin and advised them to support the ministry to disseminate its policies to the people.

He later met members of the Association of Road Contractors in the region at Cape Coast and urged them take steps to improve upon their performance.

Mr Adjei-Darko warned that the ministry would not hesitate to blacklist any inefficient company.