Jonathan Worries over N7trillion Uncompleted Projects!

President Goodluck Jonathan has expressed deep worry over the large number of ongoing projects across the country as the Presidential Projects Assessment Committee who submitted their report said the 11,886 capital projects require N7.78 trillion to complete.

Jonathan noted that his concern stemmed from the financial implications of completing the projects but stated that he would peruse the report and capture the funds in subsequent budgets in order to ensure their completion.

He commended the committee's painstaking efforts in the compilation of the report and stressed the need for the country to work through plans to avoid dotting the landscape with uncompleted projects which his administration wants to avoid.

He spoke at the Presidential Villa, Abuja when the Committee headed by Mr. Ibrahim Bunu went to submit the report he commissioned them to put together for the country to know its outstanding project commitments and how to make budgetary appropriation to complete them.

Bunu had advised that the government should prioritise the projects it intends to handle so that it can attend to the most important and needed ones and also how to budget to complete the capital projects especially to assist towards completing projects within the vision 20-2020.

He noted that with the prevalent N1 trillion budget for capital projects, it might take about eight years to complete them taking into consideration the  inflationary effects, pointing out that the over 200 sites they visited revealed the enormity of the jobs yet to be completed.

The Committee blamed the dire situation on poor project management, mediocrity and inadequate budgetary allocation coupled with high cost of financing. They also said that undermining of the Bureau for Public Procurement (BPP) Act lack of direction for the situation.

"There are about 11,886 on-going federal government projects amounting to N7,775,974,402,995.63, calculated on the basis of the sums at which the contracts were originally awarded. Following the committee's in-depth assessment of many of the projects, we take no joy in confirming that there is indeed evidence of large scale, widespread institutional mediocrity, deficiency of vision and lack of direction in project management", he lamented.

Apart from streamlining projects, he made case for proper funding of projects which should be released for contractors to continue staying on site till completion of their jobs while the government should, if it lacks funds, seek for alternative sources of funding the projects.

On the way forward, the committee enjoined Jonathan to ensure that all the funds appropriated for capital projects are fully released as at when due so as to make it possible for contractors to continue to execute projects in the most effective and efficient manner.

"There is the need to streamline and down size the on-going projects to a manageable proportion through a well thought out realisation process. And then, explore alternative sources of funding including issuance of federal government bonds and Private Partnership arrangements," Bunu said.

Source:
ThisDay