KUCHING: Infrastructure Development and Communication Ministry has clarified that bad weather, land issues as well as existence of facilities and utilities such as water pipe have been the major cause of delay in completing Public Works Department (PWD) projects.
Its minister Dato Sri Michael Manyin who is now traveling in Betong and Sri Aman areas to check on PWD projects, said a few projects have been delayed due to bad weather.
“For example, in Buso and Beladin, the soil type is such that when it rains, it is impossible to continue with the road building project.
“Should that be the case, there is definitely a delay.
“When that happens, there will be an extension of completion date which we do not consider as ‘delay’,” Manyin told The Borneo Post yesterday.
Another cause of delay, he pointed out has been due to land issues where there was blockade by the affected community.
“There are projects which were approved but due to unsettled land issues, the projects could not be implemented,” said Manyin.
Citing the example of the RM94 million worth of road in Long Lama, he said the project was approved but nothing has been carried out by the contractor because the local people have been setting up blockades there, objecting to the project.
“We have issued the letter of offer to the contractor where the terms of the tender state they have to resolve the land issue first before they can proceed with the project.
“Until now, the contractor managed to settle only two km of road reserve area with the local community.
“Even Land and Survey Department has difficulty in going to the farms of the local community to evaluate crop compensation.
“The project was awarded in February.
“For eight months now, construction of the road could not even start. Definitely, there is a lot of delay in this project,” said the Tebedu assemblyman.
Apart from this project, another RM200 million worth of project in Lapok is also facing delay due to blockade by the local community.
Crops have been planted on the road reserve and the local affected community has been asking for compensation where negotiation is ongoing.
The project, according to Manyin is again “delayed”.
He said another cause of delay has been due to the fact that some facilities or utilities have already been in existence on some road reserves which the new road would be passing through.
“To tackle the issue, we will first have to relocate these facilities or utilities before we can continue with the projects,” said Manyin who stressed that PWD completed most projects on time, except for some special cases.
The Auditor-General’s Report 2012 has revealed that 59 or 26.2 per cent of the 225 projects valued at RM8.07 billion carried out by state PWD and Land and Survey Department were not completed within the stipulated period.