NHA reverses disqualification of contractor

Hyderabad-Sukkur Motorway Project

ISLAMABAD - The National Highway Authority (NHA) has opened financial bids of two contractors for Hyderabad-Sukkur Motorway on Thursday after clearance of M/s Techno-CMC-ACC Consortium from the Grievance Redressal Committee. 

A bid of M/s Techno-CMC-ACC Consortium was earlier declared technically unviable by a bid evaluation committee that left M/s Zahir Khan and Brothers as the sole runner behind in the race.  

However, sources informed that the M/s Techno-CMC-ACC not only approached Grievance Redressal Committee (GRC) against their disqualification but also put pressure on the road authority from certain quarters. 

After disqualifying M/s Techno-CMC-ACC, the incumbent management of NHA was also in a fix as they have no other option but either to give a multi-billion Sukkur-Hyderabad Motorway project to previous government’s ‘blue eyed’ contractor ZKB or annul the process. 

Moreover, according to the sources, the present government wants to initiate the said multi-billion project at any cost before next general elections as well to get political mileage but it was impossible because till the final decision from Grievance Redressal Committee, NHA could not move forward to the next stage. 

Therefore, the Grievance Redressal Committee has reversed the decision of disqualification of M/s Techno-CMC-ACC and declared it as qualified for the project.  

When contacted, NHA’s spokesperson Sohail Aftab told The Nation that after finalisation of Departmental Bid Evaluation Report, the aggrieved party opted for launching their plea in the Grievance Redressal Committee (GRC) against their disqualification. 

He said GRC is an established forum under the rules and any aggrieved contractor can approach this forum before the final award is made. 

He explained that evaluation of the financial bids is now in progress, which will be completed soon.   

It is pertinent to mention here that this is a second attempt of the incumbent government to build a critical and last missing component of Peshawar to Karachi motorway network.

In its earlier attempt, the government had received poor response to the international tender for the project as when only a single bidder approached NHA in 2020.  

The project has been proposed to be constructed on a Public Private Partnership basis at an approved construction cost of approximately Rs191 billion. The Sukkur-Hyderabad Motorway project is expected to be completed in thirty months following financial close.

The project envisaged construction of a 306km-long green-field six-lane access controlled motorway on build-operate-transfer (BOT) basis at a cost of Rs191 billion having concession period of 25 years.

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