Chinese company gets school contract despite bidding higher than local contractors

Oct 02, 2021 News

Kaieteur News – Despite bidding higher than local contractors, a Chinese company, Shandong Degian International, was still awarded a contract to build the St. Rose’s High School located on Church and Camp Streets, Georgetown.

Representatives of the Chinese company signing the new $515M contract with the Ministry of Education last Wednesday.

A drone shot taken by Kaieteur News a year ago of the St. Rose’s High School under construction.

The contract for the construction of the school, which totals $515M was signed between the foreign company and the Ministry of Education (MOE) on Wednesday last.
MOE in a press statement boasted that a legal tendering process was conducted for the project before it was awarded to Shandong Dergian International. The commencement of that tendering process took place on July 20, 2021 and the Chinese company submitted its bid for the project alongside five other local companies.
Those local companies were: R. Bassoo and Sons Limited, Eron Lall Engineer Works, Nabi Construction Inc., Kares Engineering Inc. and L’Heureuse Construction Service.Three of those companies, R. Bassoo and Sons Limited, Kares Construction Inc. and L’Heureuse Construction Service had bid millions less than the Chinese company.
According the minutes of tendering process published on the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board’s (NPTAB) website, Shandong Degian International submitted a bid to construct the school for a total of $518M while the three local companies, R. Bassoo and Sons Limited, Kares Construction Inc. and L’Heureuse Construction Service, placed bids of $487M, $445M and $459M respectively.
The bids placed by Kares Construction Inc. and L’Heureuse for the school project were even lower than that of the engineer’s estimate of $467M.
Although there were lower bids made by the local companies, it was eventually awarded to the Chinese Company.
The MOE had stated that the St. Rose’s High School Project is expected to last for 19 months with a defects period of one year. The $515M that will be paid to the Chinese Company, according to the MOE is for a three-storey building, a sanitary block, modern classrooms, a canteen block, modern data facilities, laboratories and a lift which will have the capacity to accommodate 350 to 400 students.This is not the first time, however, that a contract was awarded to build the St. Rose’s High School. In fact, the construction of the school should have been completed already. In 2018, the former Coalition Government had awarded a contract carrying a price tag of $352M to Courtney Benn Contracting Services Limited to construct a brand new, state-of-the-art St. Rose’s High School (SRHS).
An advance of $60M was handed over to the company and works were scheduled to commence in August 2018. It was agreed that the new state-of-the-art building would have been completed in 18 months.
However, two years went by and only a few piles were driven into the ground for the foundation.
In May of 2019, Chairman of the SRHS Board of Governors, Kenrick Thomas, had indicated that an alteration in the school’s design had resulted in the delay of construction. A year passed after then and still nothing was done.
No other excuse by the chairman or the company was given since then as to why no significant progress was made in construction.
The St. Rose’s School Board had broken the silence in September 2020 claiming that Courtney Benn Contracting Services Limited had abandoned the project.
Two months later, the current administration terminated the contract with the company and shortly after in 2021, the Attorney General Anil Nandlall filed a lawsuit on behalf of the State against the contractor for a total of $400M.
The project was retendered in July 2021 and it is still unclear whether the $60M advance paid to the previous contractor was ever recovered.