That yet another request for extending the time for completing the all-important four-lane Dhaka-Chittagong highway would be made soon by the Roads and Highways Department (RHD) was quite expected.
The expectation or fear, whatever one likes to call it, has come true. The RHD is set to make a fresh request to the Planning Commission (PC) to extend the tenure of the project by another year. The project, according to its revised schedule, was to be completed by December next.
The RHD may not make a request to hike the project cost while seeking the time extension. But if its past track record is any guide the department will surely make a request to this effect very soon.
The RHD officials must have felt embarrassed while making the latest request to the PC for they have made enough of requests either for time extension or for hike in cost for this particular road project.
In fact, the Dhaka-Chittagong four-lane highway conversion project has become a symbol of delay in project execution and cost-hike in the case of public sector projects.
About 69 per cent of the project, which was launched in 2006, was completed until last month. The project got extension of execution time thrice until March 2013 and its original cost, Tk 21.68 billion was hiked to Tk 31.90 billion by the executive committee of the national economic council (ECNEC) in March 2013. So, the RHD will be seeking the project execution time for the fourth time. The probable hike in cost is not known. But, surely, there will be some hike.
The RHD's road project is not a unique example of cost escalation and delay in execution of public sector projects. Such unpalatable developments have been taking place with a large number of projects of other government ministries and agencies.
A Bengali daily, for example, reported the other day that the cost of a Rajdhani Unnyan Kartipakkha (Rajuk) project for the Purbachal Satellite town had gone up tenfold, from Tk 5.0 billion to Tk 50 billion over the years. The implementation of the project, however, has not yet been taken up for implementation.
In the case of Dhaka-Chittagong four-lane project, the main reason for the delay and consequent increase in project cost is the selection of a wrong foreign contractor, a Chinese firm, which got the major part of the construction work. The Chinese firm has been unusually slow and irregular in accomplishing the work awarded to it under the contract.
But the question is: who pays for the delay and cost escalation? And the answer is simple, the taxpayers. A section of policymakers and the project execution agencies would deliberately create a situation in which there remains no option other than increasing allocations for development projects.
However, the delay in project execution, it is widely believed, pays dividends to the officials concerned. It is estimated that nearly half of the money invested in a public sector project finds its way into the pockets of officials and contractors concerned. So, the bigger the investment is, the fatter are their purses.
Large projects such as roads, highways and bridges do require land acquisition. If noticed carefully, one would find that delay in project execution and cost escalation are more of routine affairs in these projects. For this type of projects, the agencies concerned are required to acquire land. The delay, allegedly, is made deliberately so that some unscrupulous people can build kutcha structures on the designated land to claim higher compensation which is shared with the officials of those agencies. In fact, much of the project money is embezzled in the name of land acquisition.
The Planning Commission or the Implementation, Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED) should be aware of all these developments. When common people are in the know of things, it is hard to believe that the PC or the IMED do not have any knowledge of it.
The problem with the PC is that it either does not have the power or does not feel like exercising its power in fixing irregular practices in project formulation and execution. There are instances galore where the PC had sent back projects citing justified reasons. But those were again sent to the PC with minor or no changes for its approval. Moreover, unapproved and unimportant projects are often sent for inclusion in the annual development plans under political considerations.
Such unhealthy practices have been creating serious distortions in development planning and resource allocation. The country's public sector development administration is already beset with so many problems that the quality of project execution has deteriorated seriously in recent days, leading to the bulging of the unused external project assistance to an unbelievable proportion.
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