The multibillion-dollar East Coast Demerara Road Project (Betterhope to Belfield) has been completed. The link is expected to be commissioned tomorrow, a statement from the Ministry of Public Infrastructure said.
The US$47M contract was awarded to China Railway First Group limited (CRFG) in 2014 under the previous government. Works, however, did not begin until August 2017. The project was put on hold after several concerns were raised by the Export and Import (EXIM) Bank of India – that is funding the project through a loan agreement – over the cost of the project. It was disclosed that the contract sum was relatively low.
The Coalition government, after it assumed office in 2015, embarked on a process of “contract adjustment” in 2016, which saw the sum being increased by US$7M.
While the Betterhope to Belfield stretch is complete, the government has plans to go further east. It has already received the blessing of the EXIM bank to extend the scope of the works.
The Guyana Standard understands that the government intends to expand the works in a phased manner: from Belfield to Mahaica, then to Rosignol, Berbice. A source told this publication that the designs for the extension have already been completed with funding from the Kuwait government.
The Chinese contractor will be retained for the additional phases of the project, despite being blacklisted by the World Bank. The company was debarred for engaging in fraudulent practices under the Dasu Hydropower Stage Project, in Pakistan. The barring makes CRFG ineligible to bid on future Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and World Bank Group-financed projects for the period of the debarment, which runs from September 17, 2019, to September 16, 2021.
Public Infrastructure Minister, David Patterson told the Guyana Standard earlier this year that the contractor will be retained since the debarment was done after the contract was awarded to the company. Additionally, he said that works are merely an extension of an existing contract, and not a new contract.
