…gov’t calls out PPP for unethical practices in CJIA project
…says contractor worked unsupervised for 18 months

UNETHICAL practices by the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) throughout the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) Expansion Project are the basis of many challenges experienced by the current government and any investigation will prove such.

These were remarks shared by Minister of Public Infrastructure, David Patterson, on Wednesday, following the call for such by former Minister of Public Works, Robeson Benn, in a Tuesday release.

While pointing out the many shortcomings of the project under the PPP, Patterson also indicated that an investigation would only show that the government adheres to procurement laws unlike its predecessor.

Patterson presented his rebuttal to Benn’s remarks on his Facebook page accompanied by documentary proof of the contract signed in 2011 between the PPP and China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC).

While Benn claimed that the project was supervised, Patterson said that the Supervising Consultants MMM group Limited, in association with Caribbean Engineering and Management Consultants (CEMCO), did not commence their supervision until July 1, 2014.

In a previous article, the minister explained that this meant that CHEC worked for over 18 months without independent supervision. “Project supervision fell, initially, under the Works Service Group (WSG) of the Ministry of Public Works until an international supervision consultant, MMM Group, in association of CEMCO, was awarded the supervision consultancy. This WSG resort was not unusual and natural and necessary in the circumstances to maintain project schedules,” Benn stated in the release.

However, Patterson rebutted: “This is an incredible statement coming from a former minister of works in response to the lack of independent supervision on a design and build contract for more than three years after the contract signing. In my over 25 years as a consultant in the construction industry, I have never heard of any government or even private sector organisation supervising a D&B contract in-house, the reason is simple – risk.”

He explained that a design and build contract means that the contractor designs the project; submits it to the client’s representatives, who review and approve the designs after which the contractor begins building the project.

Although Benn attributed the 18-month delay of the project to “the process of obtaining a consultancy”, the minister said that it is standard practice worldwide for projects similar to the CJIA expansion to see a project consultants being retained long before contractors are even engaged. “A simple google search will confirm these details,” Patterson said.
With the PPP, under Benn’s leadership, allowing project supervision to come from the Public Works Ministry’s WSG, it caused Patterson to express the adage ‘a lawyer who represents himself has a fool for a client’.

The minister also lambasted the Benn for ignoring crucial issues during the planning of the project which have since affected the way it is being conducted under the present administration.

In a previous release, Patterson highlighted that at the time of the contract signing there were no feasibility studies; soil investigations; site surveys; preliminary reports or detailed studies conducted.

Benn made no remarks on the same in his release safe to state that CHEC “took the opportunity to examine the project site before entering into a design and build fixed-price contract” and that there were several “high-level” visits made by minsters.

He also spoke to a “geotechnical examination” of the planned northern extension by CHEC, which saw them advising that the entire length of fill to the north would be excessive.
This led to the decision to share the 1,000 meters extension between the north and south of the runway 50:50.

However, Benn made no mention of when this “geotechnical examination” took place and whether it was prior to the signing of the contract.

“Former Minister Benn makes no mention of several important issues such as the complete lack of feasibility studies, soil investigations [and] market surveys before the award of the CJIA contract and, most importantly, the lack of any public procurement process in selecting the contractor,” Patterson pointed out.

FREE SAND
Benn has also sought to justify the contract signed by his party which allowed for the provision of sand, free of cost, to the contractor within a 12km radius of the project. It also bound the government to paying US$3.115 per cubic metre for the “exploit and transportation of sand” for the project which racked up to a total of $US13,718,460.

Benn stated: “Sand had to be provided free of royalties, which are costs that would have been charged back to the project, anyway. Sand provided was designed to allow for placement of an engineered fill, at levels of compaction and stability to provide for a safe, stable runway extension.”

While Benn also blamed CHEC for seeking a US$30M project sum increase for the project delay, Patterson noted that all issues coming from the project under the PPP can be tied to unethical practices.

UNETHICAL PRACTICES
Case in point, Patterson said that it would be interesting to hear from the former minster how and where was the project conceptualised, and how the contractor came to know of the government’s interest in expanding the airport while the rest of the country was unaware.

“We learnt about it from a press release from the construction company in Jamaica. The former minister may also want to comment on if he considered it appropriate to be signing a contract of this size and nature, the day before the general elections in 2011,” Patterson challenged.

Though failing to shed light on these matters in his release, Benn chose to highlight that the project has been “tremendously modified” and called for a “full-fledged public investigation into how a fixed-price contract could be subject to changes in scope and intent”.

Minister Patterson has since welcomed such an investigation even as he long outlined that taking up the project in 2018 with 35 per cent of funding already expended, the government was presented with a narrow set of options. The minister said previously that his team has worked hard to salvage the airport expansion project within the existing constraints and is proud of the outcome and the benefits for the country.

He said that the government ensured that it stuck to the guidelines that the contract sum would remain at the same level; the runway would be completed to international specifications and the terminal buildings would adequately accommodate projected passenger increases. It also ensured that residents of Timehri North would not be removed unnecessarily.

The PPP had planned to move over 2000 residents as part of the project. “His call for an investigation is most welcomed. In fact, the reason we are having this open debate on this project is based on my belief that public procurement is exactly that – public,” Patterson said on Wednesday. He added: “Gone are the days when the cry for ‘an investigation’ sends shivers down the backs of public officials. We are in a more enlightened and informed age.”