Melamchi to terminate contract with the CMC

Kathmandu, Jan. 20: As the Melamchi Water Supply Development Board (MWSDB) is preparing to terminate the contract with the Italian contractor company CMC, the much-awaited Melamchi Water Supply Project (MWSP) is likely to face the time and cost overrun.

The board is preparing to issue the 'Notice to Contract Termination' against the CMC on Monday.

As per the existing law, the contractor has 14-day to contact board and if it wanted to continue the project construction, it might have the responsibilities back. But the contractor is out of communication since 15 December 2018.

"There were multiple efforts from our side to establish communication with the contractor but the latter did not respond to it," said Rajendra Prasad Pant, Senior Divisional Engineer at the MWSDB.

CMC officials had left the country in December to celebrate Christmas. Though the Italian Embassy in India – which also has the jurisdiction of Nepal, and Consulate General of Italy in Kathmandu had given their assurance of the officials' return, there has been no information about them since then.

Since there are few chances of CMC's return to the project, the government has to initiate a new procurement process. Pant said that the project has to start a normal procurement process and might need to follow the Procurement Guidelines of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the main financer of the national pride infrastructure project.

MWSP was started in 2002 and supposed to be completed in 2007 but it has achieved about 92 per cent physical progress. The deadline of this project has been extended multiple times in the past couple of years.

Despite the promises by the three prime ministers in the past three years, the project that would bring about 170 million litre water per day to the Kathmandu Valley in the first phase couldn't be completed.

According to Pant, the progress at the supply line construction is about 80 per cent and the head works construction is not begun yet which will take 3-6 months to complete.

The re-tendering of the remaining construction work will take another couple of months and the delay in the commencement of the construction of diversion way in the Melamchi River means additional disturbance due to flood in the rainy season.

MWSDB said that the concerned ministries like the Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Water Supply, Cabinet and the donor should find more effective ways to expedite the project.

Published in The Rising Nepal daily on 21 January 2019.