BBA plans to appoint consultants

The Bangladesh Bridge Authority (BBA) is planning to appoint consultants to help them carry out the country's first-ever Karnaphuli tunnel project by sorting out problems with the project's contractor.
Officials said the consultants will help the BBA in evaluating various decisions and steps to be taken by the Chinese government-designated contractor as some problems may arise in absence of any competition in the project.
As the government has already agreed to construct the Karnaphuli tunnel with the Chinese government's funding, this service will support the government in taking different decisions and actions against the proposal and design of the single contractor, they added.
"We are taking preparation to appoint the consultants on the basis of design-build-construction-supervision," said BBA Chief Engineer Mohammad Kabir Ahmed.
He, however, said as the project will be implemented under the government-to-government (G2G) arrangement, the option for competition has been limited. The BBA has to take support to improve its understanding level and take the best possible decisions for the country, he told the FE.
The BBA last month received the commercial proposal from China Communications Construction Company Ltd (CCCC) to construct the Karnaphuli tunnel after the ministry of commerce (MoC) designated it following a joint statement signed between the prime ministers of Bangladesh and China in June last year.
The BBA is yet to evaluate the proposal due to lack of expertise for analysing this kind of project proposal. The project is yet to get the detailed design and study to understand the environmental impact and take resettlement plan for smooth implementation of the expensive project.
When asked how can be a commercial proposal with cost of implementation is placed without detailed design, the chief engineer said the commercial proposal of the company indicates its standpoint and will make the BBA understand standard ability of the company to construct the tunnel.
The process of selecting the consultants would start after approval of the development project proposal, the chief engineer added.
Meanwhile, the BBA has selected a British citizen Anth Sullivan as an individual consultant to evaluate the commercial proposal of the Chinese company without inviting expression of interest.
The chief engineer said the selection was made as per curriculum vitae of consultants of different companies including Indonesia, Holland and Australia having expertise of consultancy in tunnel work. He claimed that the entire process has been done in line with public procurement rule.
Officials said the BBA has already short-listed the companies to work as consultants for the environment management plan (EMP), resettlement action plan (RAP) and land acquisition plan (LAP) under one package. All the short-listed companies are from the national level.
Although the local EoI was called for the entire work, officials said international firms could have participated. "But no application from any international firm was received," said an official.
The BBA has also taken step to construct the Karnaphuli tunnel after CCCC found the 3.4 kilometre passageway viable at the estuary of the river which connects the Chittagong port city with deep-sea port and Cox's Bazar. The cost was estimated at US$ 692 million.
The study proposed the width about 700 metres and depth 9-11 metres. In the feasibility study, the company proposed three options, but voted for this estuary as the two proposed locations were close to three Karnaphuli road bridges constructed upstream.
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