Following three separate sets of tests, the foundation on the Supply Health Centre has been declared a failure and the Region Four council says that the contractor will have to redo the work.
Stabroek News was unable to contact the contractor, Navin and Son’s Construction, for a comment yesterday on the East Bank Demerara project.
That three separate tests had to be done on the facility before a conclusion was arrived at will raise questions about the testing capacity and protocols here.
According to a press release from the Regional Democratic Council (RDC), Regional Executive Officer (REO) Pauline Lucas says Navin and Son’s Construction will be tasked with redoing the works.
The declaration by Lucas was made as she addressed several regional councillors in a response to questions and concerns about the project.
According to the statement, Lucas told the councillors that she had initially sought help from the Ministry of Public Infrastructure (MPI) to test the foundation after concerns arose. In order to get a second opinion she also requested help from the University of Guyana, and the results were starkly different from the ones obtained by the Ministry.
Lucas said that the first test which was conducted by MPI had given the green light for the foundation. She said the second test was done by the University of Guyana which showed that the foundation had not met the required Pounds per Square Inch (PSI), the statement said.
It explained that the tests by MPI showed that the PSI was above 3,500 while the results from the University of Guyana showed it as being below 1,500 PSI, with two columns having approximately 1,700 PSI while another had 2,700 PSI. The statement said that the UG test concluded that everything had failed.
The differing results prompted Lucas to conduct a third test, and this time she opted for a joint test involving both the Ministry and the University along with a representative of the contractor.
“Because we have two varying [results] and it’s not that one has a five here and there difference, I decided to conduct a joint test between the University of Guyana and the Ministry of Public Infrastructure and all parties involved including the contractor. However the contractor did not send anyone… Again, that test showed that the Ministry of Public Infrastructure’s tests, two of them were below the level and the other two while they passed, were less than what the first test said,” the statement quoted Lucas as saying.
As a result, Lucas informed the councillors that her immediate course of action would be to write the contractor and after which, legal action would follow.
The statement said that she stressed that she had no intentions of accepting any sloppy or poor quality work and declared, “I will be writing the contractor shortly indicating that in our view the project has failed and he would have to redo the foundation and column again at his own expense. Failing which I would seek other legal actions to be taken against the contractor.”
The statement also added that several councillors condemned the contractor’s actions and openly supported the decision by Lucas.
“Councillor Ali Majeed told his colleagues that he has visited the site of the project and is concern[ed] over the conduct and state of the compound, questioning whether the contractors have had any prior experience with similar or such large projects. He said that the manner in how they are conducting and were carrying out the project certainly leaves much to be desired,” the statement added.
Last week, Lucas had also ordered another contractor, who was working on the Eccles Health Centre, to resupply a quantity of zinc sheets after the wrong ones were delivered.
