Lautoka City Council ends contracts for the Swimming Pool Project

The Lautoka City Council has confirmed that it has notified the Building Contractor and the Project Manager of the Swimming Pool Project of the end of their contracts with the City Council as there has been a significant delay in the completion of the project and the cost of the project has increased from an initial estimate of $2 million to $12.6 million.

This has been confirmed by the Special Administrator Chair for Ba and Lautoka, Debra Sadranu who says the council will be calling fresh tenders with a view to bringing the project for a quick completion and to ensure that not only the residents of Lautoka but everyone in Fiji, visiting athletes and the tourists are able to enjoy the facilities.

She says the contractor for the pool and associated facilities was appointed on 18th June, 2018 and work was expected to be completed on 18th March, 2019.

Sadranu says the initial project was for 2 swimming pools, one competition pool, a community pool and associated facilities at an estimate cost of $2 million.

She says a Project Manager and lead consultant was appointed in 2016 and a further concept proposal was done where the new project was proposed to be built at a different location with a 10 lane competition pool, 8 lane warm up pool, a children's pool and associated facilities such as a medical room, 2 sets of public convenience, 2 sets of change rooms, a pool attendants room, storage room, a ticket booth and 2 pump rooms.

This was to be built to Olympic International Standards.

Sadranu says 2 contractors were engaged where one was to construct the swimming pools and another to construct the buildings and associated facilities.

She says a new concept proposal resulted in the increase in the cost to $3 million and to a further $7.8 million from the initial estimate of $2 million.

Sadranu says by December 2017, the project cost had then escalated to $12.6 million and this is an increase of 630% from the initial $2 million estimate by the lead consultant.

She says findings have revealed that the contractor of the buildings and associated facilities was not able to complete its contract by 18th March, 2019 citing wet weather, shortage of materials, delays in progress payments by Lautoka City Council as reasons for not being able to complete their contract on time.

She says there some delays in processing payments due to stringent approval and vetting processes in place to protect public funds.

Sadranu says the Lautoka City Council gave the contractor 6 more months from 19th March last year however, they were not able to complete the project by then as well.

Lautoka City Council CEO Mohammed Anees Khan says 98% of the work on the main swimming pools and 30% of the work on other facilities have been completed.

He says the Council hopes the project will be completed by March next year with the new contractors.