By a Correspondent
Transport and Infrastructure Development Minister Felix Mhona has said the government will not pay for shoddy work by contractors engaged to carry out national projects.
Speaking during Senate’s question time, Mhona said the government would only pay contractors after it is satisfied with their work.
“The desire of the Government is to make sure that we empower our citizenry. Secondly, one who is given a tender must perform satisfactorily since we are tapping into the fiscus of the nation. I want to assure the august Senate that there is no way we can give a tender and be happy if we have shoddy works,” he said.
“… we warned contractors that times of getting money from the Government are over, especially if you do not do proper work. I am happy to say that the current legislation that we have allays the fears of contractors just being paid without performing.
“We only pay when we are happy. We have got what we call Interim Payment Certificates. Those who are into construction or provision of services would know that you can only raise that IPC and be paid after monitoring exercise.”
Mhona said there has been a mushrooming of bogus companies with the intent of undercutting when they tender, “but when we ask them to go and perform the work, they have been found wanting.
“Also, it was my humble plea in the National Assembly and in this august Senate to say let us have punitive measures, especially aligning our Procurement Act which will then allow us not just to focus on the pricing modalities. We need to move away from that not focusing mainly on the price because the tendency amongst some of these unscrupulous contractors would tender lowly so that they get the job.
‘When they go out, they will not perform, so this is something that we are working on as a Ministry of Transport to deregister such contractors and we have got a register in each province.”
