By Kinyera Anthony Lakomekec
Pader District Resident Commissioner on Wednesday recommended that the Inspectorate of Government and Criminal Investigation Department will make a forensic audit during his monitoring of Ogom Seed Secondary School construction, due to alleged corruption accompanied by shoddy work done by the Jeep construction company limited for a project worth over 2 billion shillings.
Milton Odongo, the Pader RDC made recommendations after seeing most of the construction works unfinished in the school including; the teachers toilet left at the foundation level, all classroom blocks, the teachers quarters, and there is no football pitch, among others.
Odongo further stated that the constructors who did the work must be held accountable including the district engineer who recommended payment to be made yet the work wasn’t done as expected. He added that he will direct the CAO Pader, Chelimo Alex to halt payments of the remaining balance worth 700 million shillings to the contractor until the construction is completed despite demand from him.
However, Benedict Lubang, the Pader district engineer said he inspected the construction site and found out that it was worth paying the 1.3 billion shillings to the contractor. He added that they wrote a letter that seeks to address the concerns that the RDC raised during his visit.
According to Lubang, there is time for the work to be completed since it is supposed to end in May 2022. He added that his office has not yet got any demand from the contractor to clear his remaining balance worth Shs. 700 million shillings.
David Odong, the Ogom Seed Secondary School deputy headteacher applauded the district leader’s effort in unearthing the corruption scandal involved in the construction of the school by saying most of the construction had not been completed.
He added that the school leadership was denied access to the bill of quantity (BOQ) by some technical people despite being public documents that will allow them to verify some items being used by the contractor.
The 2-billion-shilling project was awarded to Jeep construction Company Limited under the World Bank-funded Intergovernmental Fiscal Transfer (UGIFT) program on 9-May 2019 by the central government, and it’s to be completed on 3rd May 2022.
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