By ABAH ADAH, Abuja
Contrary to popular belief that the delay in the delivery of most highway projects in Nigeria are as a result of lack or untimely release of funds, Works Minister Sen. Nweze David Umahi has accused some contractors of deliberately delaying contracts in order to ask for review of price when prices of materials increase.
The Minister made this known while briefing newen in Abuja on Tuesday on the recently re-awarded Abuja-Kaduna-Zaria-Kano Highway project following termination of Julius Berger Plc’s contract, and on reports making the rounds that it was re-awarded to an incompetent company.
Umahi affirmed that the new company, Infiouest International Nigeria Limited, was competent enough to handle the project successfully, noting that Julius Berger was behind some “misleading information published on Monday following the revocation of the it’s contract.
He explained that the project was terminated after 14 months and over 20 meetings between Julius Berger and ministry of Works without resolution on the timeline and fair price on the projects.
He also drew attention to the reports carried by some national dailies in which the name of the new company for the job was written as InfoQuest Nigeria Limited, instead of Infiouest International Nigeria Limited.
The Minister said portions of the Abuja-Kaduna-Kano Road delivered by Julius Berger was already failing, accusing Julius Berger PLC of inciting Nigerians against the federal government with it’s rhetorics on road projects.
According to the Minister, Julius Berger lacks the necessary equipment to execute jobs awarded to it “Berger is living in past glory”.
He said, “They (Julius Berger) just said that they had finished the project 65%, that’s 750 kilometers. I don’t want to tangle with them on that. But if you have finished the project 65% and what was certified and paid was 391 billion with no debt to you, why are you asking for additional 1.1 trillion to finish the remaining 35%?
“And let me say that we are engineers, fellows of the society of engineers. We did not read our own engineering from the backyard. We went to better schools than some of these people that are claiming that they are engineers.
“The Abuja Kano, and I want anybody to look at it, is failing. This 65% is failing. Go and look at it and you see that there are patches already on the project. And so nobody should come to teach us engineering. We understand engineering very well”.
He maintained that refusal of the government to pay additional 1.1 trillion was the beginning of the the problem.
Explaining further, Umahi said, “We negotiated for 14 months. And again, they just said they were going to finish the remaining so-called 35% in three years.
“And I said, no, they said they won’t finish in 14 months. We are talking about the entire remaining sections, which was 240 kilometers.
“And so we now said, okay, since you can’t finish in 14 months, we now disaggregate the project and we took out Section 1 and Section 3 and we gave it out on tax credits as two projects,” adding that President Bola Tinubu in his desire to complete the project in good time refused the tax credit scheme and gave ministry the go ahead to do proper due process and get it awarded.
“The president directed that we should extend the project at Kano to cover the Amino-Kano International Airport because the road is so bad. From the point the road stops, you see a very bad road to the international airport.
“So we also extended by, you know, another 2.5 kilometres × 2 from point zero, linking Kogi road.
“And so on the whole, you have 119 kilometres. And it was bidded for. And the no objection that we got is for 252.9 billion.
“And it also includes additional work. So the additional work is the entire stretch of the roads to have solar lights so that travel time which could be utilised during the night and the safety could be enhanced.
“And we’re very shocked, you know, because if you check 119 and you check 250 this day, we would have awarded that job at less than 2 billion per kilometre.
“But what Berger was asking and insisting was 3.12 billion per kilometre for an existing road. And again, we are using reinforced concrete to do this job. It is not just to develop it, but to also make it to be durable.
“And so those that are demarketing us should begin to look at what the contractor will do as soon as they approve it.
Speaking on the Bodo Bonny road project currently handled by Julius Berger, he said the contractor reneged on agreements, demanding additional 80 billion to complete the job this year in September.
“And let me state that there is no place that Berger is working for Minister of Works that they have agreed on a dialogue, or give and take.
“And I give you the example in the Bodo Bonny road. The project was reviewed.
I can’t know the exact price at which the past administration reviewed it, but we made a contract of 199 billion with an agreement that the project would not be reviewed again, but in September, Berger reneged on that agreement, insisting that the project be reviewed.
