Daily SME reports today about the contract for the construction of a motorway section near Zilina, which more than doubled in cost from the initial quotation in the tender.
The company Vahostav built a 3-km section of motorway between the village of Skalite and the border with Poland that was initially to cost around EUR 41 million, but the final price tag for the state comes to EUR 87 million. The construction was started back in 1997 and was supposed to be completed in 2000, but still isn’t finished.
The National Highway Company (NDS) puts the excessive increase in the final price down to the extended period of construction and inflation. The company Vahostav is owned by Juraj Siroky, who has long been pinpointed as the main sponsor of PM Robert Fico’s Smer-SD party, and has a very favourable history of winning government tenders.
Hospodarske Noviny reports how the successful Vahostav now looks set to cash in an additional EUR 2.6 million thanks to an addendum to an order worth almost EUR 140 million signed back in 2011 and how the company won yet another tender last week for a flyover near Povazska Bystrica worth around EUR 937,000.
Yet another fine example of EU funds being used to line pockets – but what the hell its not Slovak money is it? Never heard of contract penalties here? or can company’s just keep upping the costs and keep getting paid? Where are the EU Watchdogs?
Why is no one bothered – the entire system is sown up purely to allow public funds to disappear into friends and supporters pockets – and no one has the nounce or gumption to do anything about it. Maybe if the press expressed these costs in terms of money for each man, woman and child the facts may actually sink in – some hope! The over run on this ONE project has cost every Slovak about 9 Euros.
OMG DC …you used the forbidden `G1 word ……Gumption !
Wait for spell in the sin bin for that old chap….. as moaning, whining, PC correct, uneducated, classroom sneak Jimbo dobs you in to the forum headmaster because that word does not suit his own narrow view of the English dictionary .
Hard to believe this drone is a teacher by profession, althou not hard to see why he sits around taking small notes at a football field .
The website is the following: http://www.vahostav-sk.sk/kontakty
everyone can simply contact them with inquires into exactly why they’re more or less 100% more expensive than that of Canada. Tell them the Canadian Press is interested since Slovaks really can’t be torn from TV Markiza or the free Tesco shopping bus. .
Oh Smug, you`re taking the pee 🙂 …..soon you will be on the Jimbo and company moaning, moaning, I am a boring old fart, Political Correct , `hit` list .
I wonder if slovak people will do anything? With news like this so out in the open they shuold be doing protests and blockade of the road, and asking for return of funds for the construction increases.
Plus I do know that in Canada 1km of 4 lane roadway with dividing lanes costs about 5-7 million Dollars per kilometre. If this road is only 3km long and does not include some fancy bells and whistles I find the first tender of 41 million Euros to be 50% higher than Canadian costs….where workers make 3-4 times the salary of a Slovak road construction worker.
The roads in Slovakia,Richardp, are paved with gold, because they have to navigate terribly difficult geological conditions and huge mountains, unlike Canada which everyone knows is as flat as a pancake, and highway construction is a breeze. It’s therefore unfair to draw comparisons or question the integrity of Slovak state officials.