Contractors, MDA request upward revision of project cost

Multan: The contractors engaged in construction of different development projects of government departments and Multan Development Authority (MDA) have submitted a request for an upward revision of the project cost in the wake of unprecedented increase in the prices of construction material. The contractors urged the authorities to immediately release the payments, which are already delayed for the last three months.

The delay in release of payments is adversely affecting the pace of work, which is already delayed because of suspension of work. When contacted Commissioner Multan Muhammad Ali Gardezi told that some of the problems cited by the contractors are genuine but those should not have affected the pace of work on the project.

'It has always happened on such projects that payments are delayed but that should not affect the pace of work. 'We do realise that the contractors confronted with some unforeseen situation, which indeed delayed the projects. But, we also know that the delay could have been covered by putting in some extra efforts and the MDA is always eager to extend any sort of help they may need for that,' the Commissioner said.

The contractors mentioned in the letter that Commissioner Multan had assured to compensate the firm on the basis of actual escalation on market rates. 'However, when the summary was approved for the market escalation only construction material like cement, steel and asphalt were included in the summary and the POL and labour costs, which constitute more than 25 percent of the project input were left unaddressed,' the representative of contractors said.

'We do realise that they faced a lot of problems in the projects right from the beginning including the non-co-operation, delayed shifting of utility lines and all that. All these factors are being considered by the MDA and they will be given the benefit of these things both in financial terms as well as in time-frame for completion of the project,' he said.