Lot One of the East Coast Four Lane Highway Extension is being completed by Dipcon Engineering Services at a cost of approximately $463Million after the initial $468Million contract given to Falcon Transpor-tation and Construction Company was terminated last year.
It is yet unclear how much money was paid to Falcon and how much of the Dipcon contract represents a retracing of Falcon’s work. The Attorney General’s Chambers had recommended the termination of the Falcon contract in August 2012. Falcon has not spoken to Stabroek News on its grouses over the termination.
Dipcon is the firm tasked with the completion of works on Lot Two of the extension, from Le Ressouvenir to Triumph. Falcon Transportation and Construction Company and Dipcon Engineering started work on the first phase of the project, which began in October 2011. Government had previously stated that the works entailed the clearing of the right of way; the laying of a white sand base; the construction of reinforced concrete drains on either side of the road; and the construction of temporary timber bridges at key locations to facilitate access during the construction period between Better Hope and Triumph on the ECD Public Road. Government secured US$900,000 from the Kuwaiti government to prepare the design for the road expansion.
Falcon Transportation was tasked with constructing drainage systems for the public road between Better Hope and Montrose, ECD, which is Lot One of the project. The company signed a contract valued at $468,214,760 in 2011 with the Works Ministry to execute the works. However, Ministry officials, after visiting the site concluded that the works being done by Falcon were substandard, and that they were way behind schedule in terms of the level of work completed. Reports are that a team of officials from the Works Ministry visited the site to inspect works undertaken by Falcon Transportation in December of 2011 and during the inspection it was determined that several aspects of the job did not meet the required standard as set out in the project specifications. A reliable source told this newspaper that the company was expected to build concrete drainage structures with a required strength of 45 00 PSI. However, the team discovered that the company was using concrete of a lower level strength.
Unlike Dipcon’s use of prefab concrete structures, which that company sourced from the local manufacturing sector, Falcon Transportation was making its own concrete structures at the works site. This, the source noted, was one of several cost-cutting measures which the company was employing to carry out the project.
The ministry subsequently sought the advice of the Attorney General’s Chambers and Stabroek News was told by a government source last August that the latter advised that based on information and an investigation, that the contract be terminated. Other recommendations for more actions were also outlined. This has subsequently been done.
Stabroek News understands that Falcon Transportation has since taken the Ministry to court for monies they claim are owed to them.
Officials from the Works Ministry have since informed Stabroek News that Lot One of the extension will now be completed by Dipcon. Calls to the contracting firm confirmed that they have indeed been given the responsibility of finishing the work started by Falcon Transportation, and also correcting some of the work carried out by Falcon.
Last September, Cabinet Secretary Dr roger Luncheon commenting on the new $463Million contract for Dipcon said at a press briefing that while it is not uncommon when work is incomplete and has to be taken over by a new contractor, it is oftentimes an expensive proposition.
He said Dipcon ”must have found quite a bit of the work was substandard and not of the right quality and therefore the contract sum is almost as if it started all over again.” He added, “Quite a bit of undoing will have to be undertaken, so I suspect that this is why either the same amount as in the original contract is or I have seen budget exceeding the earlier contract.”
