The contract awarded to Dax Construction Com-pany to complete the botched fibre optic cable laying project was yesterday terminated by the Government of Guyana.
The contract had granted Dax the use of a number of cables for 40 years in exchange for rehabilitation and maintenance of the cable for a 25-year duration, subject to a further 15-year renewal.
According to Minister of State Joseph Harmon, the termination of the contract was mutually agreed to at a meeting between him and the Chief Executive Officer of Dax Construction Company Faizal Mohammed yesterday. Also present at the meeting was E-Government Advisor Floyd Levi.
Harmon told Stabroek News that he had “made it clear” to Mohammed that the “contract is unsustainable.”
“We… mutually agreed to review it,” Harmon explained, before adding that “he [Mohammed] understands that the conditions under this contract… is, in a sense, terminated without prejudice to rights accrued. That is we will consider moneys [he] may have already spent.”
According to a release from the Ministry of Presidency the termination is to facilitate a review of the project by a team of telecommunications experts commissioned by the government.
The release noted that Harmon informed Mohammed that “all works by Dax was to be halted while the team does its work.”
It further said, “Upon completion of the review the team will report on the project execution, the amount of money expended, the performance of contractors and consultants; [and] they are also expected to advise government on the possible utilisation of the cable and on the way forward.”
Mohammed was reported as being cooperative and committing to working with the new administration in whatever manner it decides following the release of the report.
“He did not insist on any prior rights. He was very cooperative and has said he will provide any information required to complete the review,” Harmon told Stabroek News.
According to Harmon, Mohammed “recognises that the cable belongs to the people of Guyana, not him personally, and he has agreed to work us for the betterment of the Guyanese people.”
For its part, the government has committed to treating Mohammed fairly for whatever “measured works” he would have accomplished in fixing parts of the cable.
The laying of the fibre optic cable is part of a $3.1B E-governance project and commenced in January, 2011 and was supposed to be completed in 2012. However, several setbacks saw its completion delayed. In 2014, it was revealed by the then project manager Alexei Ramotar and then Head of the Presidential Secretariat Dr Roger Luncheon that the cable laying, on which $1B had been spent, had been botched and would require approximately $2B to rehabilitate.
Dax Construction Company was at time contracted to undertake the rehabilitation works in what critics termed a “sweetheart” deal. Among the most vocal critics was the Working People’s Alliance (WPA), which accused government of consigning control for free of all of the assets of the project and a 40-year monopoly licence to a “nothing company.” It called the contract a “gift” to Dax and dubbed the 40-year contract an outrage, while urging it be cancelled immediately. The party said that assets acquired, with the monies spent thus far on the project by government, such as radio equipment, antennae and equipment to set up towers and communication posts across the country, had not been valued before the transfer of the project to Dax. As a result, it added that there is no way to know, in dollar figure amounts, how much Dax was really getting out of the project.
