Education Minister threatens to penalise contractors for unwarranted delays

Jan 09, 2012 News

Failure on the part of contractors to complete projects within the stipulated contractual period could see penalties being swiftly applied. This assertion was made by Minister of Education Priya Manickchand even as she commented on contracted school projects that have been gaining the attention of the media.

Minister of Education, Priya Manickchand

According to the Minister, she along with the relevant education officials met with contractors during the latter part of last year at which point she had categorically stated her position of zero tolerance for any unwarranted delay in meeting deadlines. “We only have three contractors working with us right now and they are working on several projects. For example we have Kares (Construction Company) and they have gotten about four schools they are working on…I met with all of the contractors and explained that we are not going to be tolerating delays and that we will be holding them to their contractual terms and that if they don’t honour those terms, we are going to apply penalties as per the contract they signed.”
The meeting with the contractors had ended with them faithfully promising to finish their contracted tasks on time, a commitment which the Minister noted even then would be something that “we will have to wait and see.”
However, although works had efficiently progressed, Manickchand revealed that some works, as at last week, were still to be completed.
This includes the completion of the chemistry lab at the Leonora Secondary School. The $293.5M education facility was commissioned two days before National Elections last year by then Minister of Education Shaik Baksh.
Apart from the cost of construction of the school, which was executed by Kares Construction Company, the then Permanent Secretary attached to the Ministry, Pulandar Kandhi said that $14.8 M was expended on furniture, $9.5M on tools and equipment and another $4.8M was directed to what he described as “two well equipped information technology laboratories.”
Utilisation of the facility commenced on January 3 last when the new school term commenced. With the arrival of about eight custom sinks from overseas for the Science Laboratory, the Minister expressed confidence that works would have been completed on the school during the past weekend. “My understanding is that the contractor was awaiting these sinks and with their arrival they will be installed allowing for the remaining work to be completed on the school,” Manickchand said.
During visits to a few schools on the West Bank and West Coast of Demerara last week the Minister appealed to teachers and school managers to be the Ministry’s “watch dogs” of various projects and urged them to seek to efficiently report on evident delays to the Regional Education Department or even Central Ministry so that corrective measures could be employed. The delay of projects, the Minister noted, cannot be taken lightly as they not only have the potential of affecting the conduciveness of the teaching environment but can also impact the actual delivery of education.