Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) legislator, Prosper Mutseyami says the government must find ways of dealing with companies who do shoddy jobs after being awarded tenders to rehabilitate roads.
Mutseyami said there are some companies that are paid to work on state roads but do a dep but do poor quality jobs, resulting in the government forking out more money to contract other companies to re-do the job.
“What is going to happen to certain companies which were awarded tenders to do certain roads but they did a shoddy job? The road has not even been completed in a year but it is already damaged. These people were already paid for the job but the state of the road is so bad,” Mutseyami said.
“The construction was substandard because they did not have the required equipment. How do you work with such companies? They are given tenders but they have no knowledge of road construction. Now, other companies are going to be contracted to complete such roads. Some of those people are relatives of people that are well known by Government top officials.”
Minister of Transport and Infrastructure Development, Felix Mhona, said the ministry adopted a system to work with ZINARA and local authorities to verify, before awarding a tender, if the contracted companies have proper knowledge and equipment for quality road construction.
“We used to have such problems where some people were contracted to do road construction without going deeper to check whether they have knowledge of proper road construction. It was learnt that those people would later subcontract other companies to do the job and also those would not be knowledgeable on road construction; they had no proper equipment which led to poorly done roads,” he said.
“Now, together with ZINARA, we gather with all local authorities to verify if those who are being contracted are the right people with the requisite knowledge to carry out the work. On our side, no one is going to be given money before satisfactorily completing the road. That has to be clear to all contractors. After a company is contracted, the Ministry officials will follow up before payment to check whether the company has done a perfect job.”
Minister Mhona added: “I agree that it happens that some people contract people who do not have knowledge on the work to be done but I promise that this will never happen, especially on the issue of infrastructure.”
“We know that in Mutare, there is a road which has a problem. When it is hot, the road surface appears as if it is about to melt but I promise you, this will not continue to happen because we will be following up on all jobs of the Ministry.”
