Door closed on shoddy road contractors
GOVERNMENT is working on modalities to recover public funds lost through under-performing contractors hired to provide services under the Emergency Road Rehabilitation Programme (ERRP).
Apart from recovering the lost funds through legal channels, the Government will not pay contractors for shoddy work, but will instead use the money to pay those hired to perfect the projects.
Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructural Development, Engineer Thedious Chinyanga, disclosed this in an interview on the sidelines of a workshop for Zimbabwe National Roads Administration (Zinara) management and the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Transport in Nyanga last Friday.
“As we implement roadworks under ERRP 2, we have noted that some contractors are not meeting expected standards as some of the roads are already showing signs of distress. Some are even failing to execute the work after being awarded the contracts.
“As Government, we have taken steps towards blacklisting in the extreme cases. We have been instructed to come up with modalities to recover using the legal route any public funds which may have been lost due to the work of under-performing contractors.
“We should get value for the money being channelled towards roads rehabilitation work under ERRP. Where we were not satisfied with the work, we have refused to pay the contractors. In scenarios like that, the contractors should go back and perfect their work if they want their money,” said Eng Chinyanga.
He added: “We are happy to note that most of the contractors who found themselves in such scenarios went back to correct their mistakes. Failure to do so, Government will hire new contractors and use those funds to pay the one who would have corrected the mistakes.
“Going forward, this will be our modus operandi because we have no room for shoddy work. We want our roads to be in perfect condition to the satisfaction of all road users.”
He said the contractors need to be supervised to avoid poor workmanship.
“Supervision of the contractors should be taken seriously by all the road administration bodies. Some contractors are failing to provide a proper scope of their work and undercharge just to secure the contract before going on to fail to deliver. They end up going on site unprepared to execute their duties.
‘‘They will be forced to make do with whatever equipment is on site, hence the shoddy work.
“The scoping of work should be done to the satisfaction of the senior authorities at the road administration bodies. We have realised that some road administration bodies do not have engineers and procurement management units, this is affecting the quality of work,” he said.
Eng Chinyanga said plans are also underway to take over the rehabilitation of some roads in cities as most of them are now impassable.
“A request has been made for the ERRP programme to be extended to the streets in our cities because of their poor state. This is a huge task and if funding is made available, nothing can stop us from executing this task. We also expect cooperation from local authorities,” he said.
In Mutare, there is little progress on the Magamba and Blessing Makunike Roads despite the contractors moving on site.
Poor workmanship characterised the Kumbirai Kangai (Aerodrome) Road, which is now littered with potholes barely a year after it wa resurfaced.
Eng Chinyanga said although progress was made under ERRP1, a lot still needs to be done to cover more ground.
“We are not totally happy with the work done last year as we didn’t meet some of our targets. We started the programme a bit late and funding was also delayed. It was rolled out as an emergency programme that was not planned for.
“Procurement of resources was also cumbersome, but we are happy with the support we got from the Procurement Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe which worked flat out to ensure that our needs were catered for.
“Some projects overlapped into this financial year due to lack of funding. When we closed the 2021 financial year, we owed contractors $3,5 billion and we had to clear these debts first before embarking on new projects.
“We have allowed contractors to tender in US dollars and we want to address the issue of late payment which is being raised by contractors.
“So we are engaging the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development to accept invoices dominated in USD and pay using the prevailing bank exchange rate at the time of payment, not on the time of invoicing.
“It is work in progress and we hope we will find each other with the officials at the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development so that the contractors can get the resources to do great work,” said Eng Chinyanga.