Another $150M to be spent on CJIA

Aug 29, 2022 News

By: Renay Sambach

Kaieteur News – After completing a US$150 million expansion and rehabilitation of the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) at Timehri, Government will be pumping another $150 million into the facility.

Minister of Public Works, Juan Edghill

In an advertisement published in Sunday’s edition of the Kaieteur News, the Ministry of Public Works, invited for bids to undertake drainage improvement and flood control structures to facilitate these additional works, and the engineer estimated that it would cost some $150 million.

It was only on August 15 that this newspaper reported that the Ministry issued another invitation for bids. That contract would allow for the construction of a storage bond and workshop at the airport – for that project the engineer estimated that it some $37 million would be needed.

All new works being done at the CJIA falls under the PPP administration plan to ‘continue modernize’ the airport. In fact, it was Minister of Public Works, Juan Edghill, who announced that citizens should expect more of their taxpayers’ dollars going towards the ‘continued modernization’ of the airport.

The Minister had noted that construction at the airport will continue because the Government has to keep making more accommodation. He had said, “We have to continue to making more accommodation, I think sooner or later with oil and gas sector growing and tourism growing and bringing in high profile tourist, we will have to have facilities for corporate jets, luxury lines…people coming here with private planes to go and do things,we have to keep expanding…”

Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) [Mike Charles Photo]

Moreover, just recently Chinese contractor, China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC) completed its part under the US$150 million airport expansion contract.

The airport expansion contract was signed in 2011 under then President, Bharrat Jagdeo, and was passed through the truncated presidency of Donald Ramotar. However, when the David Granger administration took over in 2015, it said that the very defective plan needed adjustments and changes were made. The decade-old project was awarded to CHEC for the sum of US$150 million: $138 million from the China Exim Bank and $12 million from the consolidated fund – taxpayers’ money.

When the PPP administration took office in August 2020, Minister Edghill had stated that they were not satisfied with the work that was done by the contractor and as such, they had negotiated and got CHEC to do additional works at the airport at no cost to Guyana. The additional works that were done by the contractor included a superstructure corridor and curtain wall. It was only recently that CHEC completed the works on the airport.

Notably, while the contract cost with the Chinese contractor remains at US$150M, the Government is undertaking several multi-million upgrades to the airport which were separated into three parts.

ADDITIONAL SPENDING

The additional spending by the Government has increased the amount of money spent on the airport which falls way below expectations and international airport standards. The $150 million that is expected to be spent on drainage and flood control structure – as well as the $37 million that will go towards the construction of the storage bond and workshop will also be added as additional spending.

Earlier this month, eight companies bid vying for the contract to construct a new administrative building at the airport. For this project, the engineer estimated it to cost $906 million [US$$4,309,639].

In August 2021, the Public Works Ministry had signed a contract with Kalitech Incorporated to the tune of $25.9 million [US$124,021] to design the new office building for the airport staff.

The Government also signed a $513 million [US$2,456,494] contract last year with construction company CALCO for the construction of a new building attached to CJIA’s terminal building – that new building will house a conference room, offices for the airlines and the other support agencies as well as storage bonds for the duty-free shops and concessionaires.

In September 2021, Edghill’s Ministry awarded a contract for $418,562,400 [US$2,000,000] to a local company named Total Solutions for the supply of two additional air-bridges for CJIA, some $73,248,420 more than what was paid for the other air bridges. The air bridges are slated to be installed in September.

Some other projects at the airport that the Government is funding are: $38 million [US$181,962] for an international apron and the taxiway Charlie, $23 million [US$110,135] for the rehabilitation of the existing roof at the airport, construction and rehabilitation works of the VIP Lounge and new and existing commercial buildings of the airport at an estimated cost of $612 million [US$2,930,554], $518 million [US$2,480,436] runway, which comes with an Instrument Landing System (ILS) and $420 million [US$2,011,164], which was approved by the National Assembly for a baggage handling system for the renovated airport.

With more spending to be done on the airport, the final cost for the airport expansion is still unknown. Notably, while Minister Edghill had assured that the CJIA expansion project final cost will not surpass US$200 million –to date, the spending is currently over US$166 million.