By Suraj Narine
Local and international building contractors who abandon or deviate from their contractual obligations, will have their services terminated forthwith, warns Attorney General and Legal Affairs Minister, Anil Nandlall.
He was at the time elaborating on government’s implementation of a “no-nonsense” approach in ensuring the timely and adequate delivery of quality infrastructural works on his live Facebook programme, “Issues in the News”, last evening. The AG emphasized that “misbehaviour, misconduct, negligence, and recklessness” will not be tolerated from any contractor.
He said confirmation of government’s commitment to stamp out errant contractors comes in the form of at least two contractors of mega projects being fired recently over project delays. He referred to the letting go of Courtney Benn Contracting Services Limited (CBCSL) from the St Roses High School Building contract, and the firing of BK International for pussyfooting on the construction of a multimillion-dollar Secondary School at Yarrowkabra.
Nandlall said also that infrastructural contracts are being reviewed in a bid to have them modified to hold government engineers accountable.
“The engineer is supposed to be the government’s representative on those contracts. They are supposed to hold the contractor to the strict four corners of the contract. They have not been doing that. In fact, I believe that the evidence out there suggests that they are in bed with the contractors; they aid and abet the violations of the contract, and they benefit financially from it. That will not continue to happen anymore,” he said.
The new model is being developed by the Attorney General’s Chambers and will be implemented soon.
