SLRA and sub contractors pay courtesy call to Parliament

The Sierra Leone Roads Authority (SLRA) and three top sub-contractors including a French company called CSE, Fimate Benton-Ville Company, and China Railway Seventh Group (CRSG) on Wednesday 12^th March 2014 paid a courtesy called to the Parliamentary Oversight Committee on Works, Housing and Infrastructure at OAU Drive, Tower Hill, Freetown.

In his welcome address, the chairman of the Works Committee Hon. Kombor Kamara of Constituency 56 in the Port Loko District in the northern part of the country, described the meeting as important, and informed them that their committee summoned the contractors for a better understanding of the status of their work and to answer to questions relating to the public funds on road maintenance in the municipality, including road construction across the country.

Hon. Kombor Kamara went further to state that his committee is charged with the responsibility to oversee and monitor all the roads within and the entire country awarded to contractors and supervise their qualities and report to the public, and promised to conduct an assessment visit to all the roads as a follow up from what will be discussed.

He noted that a good number of road rehabilitation and uncompleted contracts are not progressing the development of the country rather than creating serious embarrassment for his committee especially roads maintenance and parching.

He also stated that he will fight what he called kick backs that most of the road contractors award to contractors.

Making his statement, the CSE Country Representative Desk Officer Mr. Alieu Ndaiye and team expressed appreciation, stating that significant roads infrastructure is keen towards any developed nation.

Mr. Ndaiye also assured Members of Parliaments to perform their corporate social responsibility as requested to build a retaining fence to the Emergency Hospital for the safety of the Hospital as they give free medical treatment to the people of Sierra Leone.

Mr. Ndaiye further stated that, they as CSE persist with the capability to do more road construction in the country with over 1,000 workers in the country, noting that most of their roads works like the Freetown Conakry, Port-Loko have been completed while some will be finished early June this year.

Mr. Ndaiye, Mr. Mohamed Gento Kamara a representative from the Fimate Beton-Valle Company, and Mr. David John of the China Railway Seventh Group (CRSG), all stated that they are facing urgent challenges with the utilities of the National Power Authority (NPA), Guma Valley, and Sierratel cables when doing the side road work to meet with the project timline.

In his response, the SLRA Roads Maintenance Director General Mr. Kalokoh stated that the SLRA was created and passed into Parliament and is also subordinate to the Local Government to undertake road construction, maintenance, and rehabilitation as part of their mandate, adding that based on that, had been able to provide 70 billion for the rehabilitation and maintenance of the municipality regarding parching.

He promised to continue establishing a good working relationship with Parliament and informed all district councils to build strong cordial relationships with their Members of Parliament before accessing their budget allocation.

Another committee member Hon. Paran Tarawally of Constituency 69 of Bo District warned all contractors to stop blaming certain institutions such as the National Power Authority (NPA), Guma Valley Water Company, and Sierratel for their underground cable connections.

The MP said sometimes when construction companies want to put delay on a project they used to blame these institutions for their underground cables “The committee will no longer prepare to accept any such vague excuses,” said Hon Tarawally.

Hon. Alhassan Kamara of Constituency 96 also another committee member urged the SLRA to enhance the Mayenkeh road, Kola Tree road.

By Mohamed Y. Turay

Stay with Sierra Express Media, for your trusted place in news!