THE government was forced to terminate $1.58 billion in contracts in 2020 due to the poor performance of contractors, according to the recently tabled Auditor General’s report.

“During the period under review, and based on the sample of projects examined, it was discovered that five contracts totalling $1,580,028,056 were terminated as a result of poor performance by contractors,” the report which was laid in the National Assembly said.

Leading the list of terminated contracts is the $826 million contract with BK International for the construction of the Yarrowkabra Secondary School, which was signed in 2019, and had only seen five per cent of the work completed when the contract was terminated in November 2020.

Among the other terminated contracts are the $412 million contract for the construction of the St Rose’s Secondary School, which was awarded to Courtney Benn Contracting Services; a $321.899 million contract for Ministry of Health’s (MoH) Head Office building Phase One; a $10.791 million contract for the revetment of Riverstown Creek and a $8.275 million contract for the upgrading of Brummel Street.

The contract with Courtney Benn was signed in 2018 but was terminated in November 2020, with only nine per cent of the work completed during the 18-month period. The government, shortly after, sued the company for more than $347 million for breach of contract.

New contracts for both schools have since been signed.
The terminated contract for the MoH had been awarded to Chung’s Global Enterprise. The government, through the Attorney General, Anil Nandlall, wrote the company last year informing that the contract was being terminated effective October 31, 2020, on the grounds of contractual breaches.

That contract was initially signed in 2017 and works commenced in July, 2018 with the project having been scheduled to take one year to complete.

The company, up to the time the contract was terminated, had already been paid $308.4 million and given two extensions. Only 70 per cent of the work was completed more than two years later.
The contracts for the Riverstown revetment and Brummel Street upgrade were signed in 2020.