16 months later, a Turkish Construction Firm hired to work on 92km- Muyembe-Nakapiripirit road has managed to complete only 2.74 kilometres, 3% of the entire shs 400 billion project.
Polat Yol Yapi (Turkish contractor) won the mega deal from Uganda National Roads Authority (UNRA) and was advanced shs 71 billion to immediately kick off the construction considering the urgency of the project.
Shockingly, when UNRA field officials visited the projected they learned that the contractor had managed to finish only 3% of which the works were done by local subcontractors who were never paid and have since abandoned construction.
Polat Yol Yapi was given a 28- day ultimatum to at least complete 13.8 kilometres (15%) of the road by end September this year, up to now there is no progress.
According to The Observer Newspaper which broke the story, the fate of this Turkish contractor who owns no equipment on the site apart from a generator, lies in the hands of the UNRA CEO Allen Kagina.
The UNRA officials who visited the site have been compelled to author a confidential report expressing “disgust” and calling for urgent intervention to save the multibillion project.
“Polat Yol Yapi has failed to mobilise equipment, failed to set up an asphalt plant and also failed to acquire a rock and crusher for it. As a result, they lack capacity and need to be replaced,” The Observer quotes the report.
The report adds: “What is most worrying is that Polat Yol Yapi has incurred a lot of debts and has failed to pay local subcontractors. All these complications may lead to several legal complexities yet we need to save the project. Our conclusion is that the contractor’s continued woes will render the project a death-trap.”
The project has suffered a spate of setbacks since the start in March, 2020. Matters were compounded recently on September 8 when flash floods washed away the temporary Namalu Bridge to cut off the Mbale-Karamoja route as well as that which connects Bulambuli to Moroto.
“Even the three per cent was done by the indigenous sub-contractors who have already raised a red flag about the contractor’s failure to pay. Unra cannot meddle in those contracts and have no plan to compensate the indigenous sub-contractors.”
The report describes Polat Yol Yapi as simply a middleman using indigenous companies to do the work as Arab Contractors, another Middle East company, did on the Pallisa Kumi road.
In 2019, Uganda borrowed $112m [about Shs 400bn) from the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) to facilitate the road construction project. Polat Yol Yapi controversially emerged as the best bidder with Tunisian firm SCET Tunisie becoming the supervision consultant.
However, the project was doomed from the onset when Polat Yol Yapi diverted the Shs 60bn to a road project in Kuwait while SCET Tunisie used their Ugandan associates, MBW Consulting Ltd, to do the supervision on their behalf.
“There is serious worry Polat Yol Yapi will not accomplish the task in the remaining 20 months because they lack capacity. Other than a generator, they [Polat Yol Yapi] have no equipment on the ground and even the provider of tippers demobilized them after not being paid,” reads the report. “It is despicable that they [Polat Yol Yapi] are hiding behind the Turkish embassy and hired a grader for President Museveni to launch the road in November 2020,” a report concludes.
