CDGL contractors lack expertise: Nespak declines to do third-party validation

LAHORE, Feb 28: For the last three months or so, the City District Government of Lahore has been pressing the National Engineering Services Pakistan (Pvt) Limited to carry out third-party validation of 182 development schemes but the latter has been declining to do so because the schemes lack proper design besides testing facilities for quality control. The CDGL had on Nov 26 last year requested the Nespak through a letter (No G/1989/EDO W&S) to take up 110 schemes of roads and 59 of buildings sectors under four-sector programme besides 22 schemes of road sector under city package for resident supervision or third-party validation. In response to a CDGL reminder on Dec 17 last year (No G/2108/EDO W&S), the Nespak expressed its inability to take up the assignment as the schemes were small in nature. Nespak argued that the 182 schemes were allotted to contractors who could execute works worth Rs0.26 million and did not have any surveying equipment, testing laboratories or tools, essential for resident supervision or third-party validation. The CDGL brought to the notice of Nespak through a letter (No G/2380 EDO W&S) on Dec 28 that nature and scope of schemes under four-sector and 22 schemes of city package (NA-128) had not been different than the schemes under Lahore Ring Road Project (LRRP) and city package already undertaken by it (Nespak). Two days later, the Nespak responded: "We honestly feel that our involvement in such petty work will not result in any improvement in the quality." Sharing its experience with the CDGL regarding third-party validation of 74 schemes under city package, the Nespak recalled that even none of the three contractors involved, being of no-limit category, had proper testing laboratory and survey equipment, a prerequisite to resident supervision or third-party validation. "The contractors took more than one and a half months to establish a laboratory as none of them was familiar with the quality control process and at every stage they had to be guided by Nespak staff," it said. Regarding the 182 schemes, the Nespak maintained: "In most cases, the works are almost completed up to 90 per cent or partially done and lying abandoned for the last many months. All these works have been done under the supervision of CDGL engineers who are responsible for executed works. By involving Nespak at this stage, the quality of work cannot be improved as contractors involved are not at all familiar with documentation and quality control process," it said.