Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has suggested revisiting the procurement rules to ensure the same contractor is not awarded government works repeatedly.
Her remarks came during the meeting of the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) on Tuesday (Nov 5), reports BSS.
"The prime minister said that tender documents have to be prepared in a way that a specific company doesn't get government jobs repeatedly. Her instruction is to create options so that other contractors can take part in the bidding and engage in healthy competition," the state news agency quoted Planning Minister MA Mannan saying.
Briefing the media after the meeting, he said the prime minister also asked concerned executing agencies to implement their projects speedily maintaining quality within the stipulated timeframe, according to the BSS report.
The housing and public works ministry is scrambling for alternatives after contractor Golam Kibria Shamim, whose company GKB and Company Private Ltd was awarded with a number of its construction jobs , was sent to jail on drugs- and illegal arms-related charges.
The company currently is tasked with 53 construction projects of the public works ministry of around Tk 5.5 billion.
Of these projects, his firm is working alone in 13 projects. The remaining 40 projects are joint ventures, according to the ministry, which has approved 24 of these.
Among the 53 projects, the timescale, to complete 15 is over this year but these are yet to be finished.
Up to 35 percent work has been done in three other projects that should have ended this month.
The projects that are yet to be completed after the end of the timescale include an office building for Dhaka superintendent of police at Agargaon, five complexes and a training centre for RAB in Gazipur, a 20-storey building for the Secretariat, modernisation of National Cancer Institution and Hospital, and two 16-storey buildings for Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant.
The progress of work is between 3 and 35 percent in the projects related to a 10-storey BSTI regional office in Chattogram, National Board of Revenue headquarters in Dhaka, NGO Foundation offices in Dhaka, extension of the Shaheed Suhrawardy Medical College Hospital, and development of the Bandarban General Hospital.
The construction of 672 flats for government officers in Narayanganj’s Aliganj at Tk 418.5 million was supposed to end in July this year, but the work is yet to begin after the contract was signed in March, 2017.
Shamim used to influence government officials by identifying himself as 'Narayanganj Awami League's vice president and the cooperative affairs secretary to Jubo League's central committee' in order to secure contracts.
He was arrested after a raid on his office on Sept 20 as part of the government's crackdown on the illegal gambling business.
RAB seized about Tk 20 million in cash, Tk 1.75 billion worth of fixed-deposit receipt or FDR savings, alcohol and firearms during the raid on his business in Dhaka's Niketon.
Shamim and his seven bodyguards were subsequently implicated in three cases.