SHINE A LIGHT: Concerns Rise Over High Consultation Fees

Engineering and construc­tion experts have expressed dismay over fee claims made by lead consultants who managed the rehabilitation of schools that were damaged by Tropical Cy­clone Winston.

They say construction costs of some of the projects could have been reduced, raising the question of cost control to ensure proper management of public money.

Lead consultants combined fee claims totalled at $18.5 million, separate from the $234.5 million overall construction cost.

Consultancy fee claims were based on the scope and scale of each of the 213 contracts.

Based on these two factors, the fee claims were:

·        HLK Jacobs - $7.5 million

·        Chands Engineering - $3.4 mil-lion

·        NRW Macallan - $3.03 million

·        Shri Singh - $3.2 million

·        Entec - $1.3 million.

A reputable engineering expert, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, questioned whether the fee content was reasonable under nor-mal circumstances, emphasising that charges could’ve been exaggerated.

Thats a lot of fee claims.

CIU (Construction Implementation Unit) must have someone in their team to vet it and see if reasonable the engineering expert said.

Construction Industry Council president Gordon Jenkins said everything done in the construction industry should be under a cost control situation.

The biggest problem was there wasn’t cost control, and a lot of people were spending money without checking, Mr Jenkins said.

HLK Jacob director Sanjay Kaba, Shivas Singh of Shri Singh & Associates, and Abhinesh Chand of Chand Engineering and Consultant Limited declined to comment when this edition went to press.

Homes were left in ruins at Nabauva Village.

“When an expert approves X amount, and then actual payment made is two times more and then public funds are involved, then it’s not good.”

Entec engineers had approved around $30,000 variation, but CIU overruled this and made a payment of about $70,000.

“We didn’t have a choice because we couldn’t negotiate a lot because Government still had the upper hand in the contracts,” Mr Singh said.

Variations in overall construction cost for projects handled by the lead consultants:

·        HLK Jacobs - $1.87 million

·        Chands Engineering - $941,325.03

·        NRW Macallan - $856,487.35

·        Shri Singh & Associates -$623,432.25

·        Entec Limited - $141,110.09

TAXPAYERS’ MONEY 

Mr Jenkins said anyone who uses public money should be held accountable.

“An auditor should come in, but it’s too late."

"When an auditor comes, it’s been spent, it’s gone, finished,” he said.

The handling of the school project, including the releasing of payments, was coordinated by the CIU, under the former manager, Mohammed Shah, and his team.

It is understood that construction companies also took advantage of the situation, with new ones established around 2016, when TC Winston struck Fiji.

Read More Related Stories

SHINE A LIGHT: Unraveling The Aftermath In TC Winton

SHINE A LIGHT: Examining the Rehabilitation Project

SHINE A LIGHT: Concerns Arise Over Transparency, Conflicts of Interest

NEXT WEEK: We detail why schools were not built to standard before TC Winston.

We also look at the current designs and work carried out by construction companies.

Feedback: ivamere.nataro@fijisun.com.fj

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