05 Dec 2017

 A growing trend has been observed by the Ministry of Infrastructure Science and Housing Development in which some contractors seem to be keen in stifling money from government without any work done to justify payments claimed.

It has become a common practice too that government projects experience delays culminating in contract periods for construction projects being exceeded while progress on sites could be as low as five per cent.

This was said by the the Minister of Infrastructure and Hosing Development, Mr Nonofo Molefhi when giving a keynote address during the 2017 Contraction Pitso in Gaborone.

Mr Molefhi appealed to various professional association to start paying attention to the performance of their members as this had the potential to tarnish their organisations.

The ministry he said held a Youth Construction Pitso in Maun and also engaged the industry in other fora such as the Sectoral High Level Consultative Committee meetings and other interactive meetings with contractors struggling with their projects.

He said that this year’s pitso was different in that it came at a time when the construction industry had begun professionalising and regulating itself, whereas the past ones were more focused on how government could partner with the private sector to deliver projects.

The ministry’s permanent secretary, Mr Dikagiso Mokotedi called upon stakeholders to bring forward ideas that would raise the profile of the industry.

He was of the view that issues of project failure on account of negligence, lack of commitment and indiscipline on the part of the industry was not something they should carry into the future.

“We should rid ourselves of such malpractices and disown any of our members who exhibit such behaviour.

It is time that we overcome the paralysis of finger-pointing when things go wrong and start to consolidate our efforts as a sector with a view to deliver both public and private sector projects in a manner that will demonstrate maturity of our industry and professionalism of our services and patriotism,” he stated.

Meanwhile, the director of Buildings and Engineering Services, Ms Tshepho Kebakile highlighted some of the resolutions of the 2014 Pitso among them the then being that the Ministry of Minerals Energy and Water Resources was to advocate for independent participation in power production by the private sector and the alternative sources to be included in the national grid.

She said the progress of the resolution to date was that the Electricity Supply (Amendment) Act 2016, the Botswana Power Corporation (Amendment) Act of 2016 and the Botswana Energy Regulatory Authority (BERA) Act of 2016 were passed by Parliament in July 2016.

The BERA, she said commenced full operations on September 1 and progress to date included 300 MW Morupule B (Units 5 & 6) while the preferred bidder had been identified and the project was at financial close stage.

Ms Kebakile said, still in the resolution, a 300 MW Power Plant (Greenfield) had been put on hold due to non-approval of the Environmental and Social Impact Assessment.

The other resolution, she said was that Public Private Partnership Projects were economically cost effective.

The resolution further stated that government should ensure alignment programmes and the Ministry of Infrastructure and Housing Development had to pass the resolution to the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development.

She said the Implementation Framework was done in 2009 and PPP unit was established in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development July last year.

Amendments to the Public Procurement and Asset Disposal (PPAD) Act had since been drafted and were currently under consideration, she noted.

According to Ms Kebakile, still in this resolution 17 projects had been identified following consultations with Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) with potential PPP projects, adding that the list of the projects had been published in the Ministry’s web site.ENDS