John Adams, Minna
The Niger state governor, Alhaji Abubakar Sani Bello has revoked the contract for the construction of eight kilometers Zariawa road in Suleja local government area of the state, and ordered the contractor to immediately vacate the site.
The governor who gave the revocation order on Thursday during his ongoing inspection of roads projects across the state, said the revocation has become inevitable because “the contractor has displayed a high level of incompetence in handling the work”.
The eight kilometers Zariawa roads which is meant to serve as a bypass to connect Abuja expressway from Maje in Suleja was awarded to JaJovoves Solution Service Limited in 2017 at the cost of N786 million.
However three years after, only 30 percent of the work has been done after the contractor admitted to have collected over N500million, representing about 71 percent of the contract sum.
The governor who was very angry with the level of work achieved, immediately ordered the state ministry of works and infrastructural development to look for a more competent contractor to carry on with the work.
According to the governor, “I am disappointed with what I have seen here today, and we can not tolerate this any more. From all observation, you do not have the capacity to execute the job”, he told the contractor who made fruitless efforts to convince the governor on why the work delayed.
The governor told the contractor  that “I will not waste my time. Something must have gone wrong either on our side or from your side. The work done does not in anyway commiserate with money collected”.
He assured that the government will investigate how the contractor was able to collect over  70 percent of payment when only 30 percent of work done, stressing “we will investigate this to see what went wrong and where”.
The governor who dismissed plea from the contractor for an upward review of the contractor due to high cost of materials, insisted that “We will look for a more competent contractor to handle the job. We are doubting your capacity because to be realistic this work is nothing to write home about.
“From what I am told, it’s only N200million is left of the total contract sum and technically possible that that amount can not finish this work”. He submitted.