Government | Thursday 23 April, 2015 7:55 am |

The National Anti-Corruption Commission (Nazaha) is alarmed that over 672 out of 1,526 government projects (44 percent of the total) are running behind schedule.
Nazaha President Khaled Al-Muhaisin said the anti-corruption body reviewed a number of projects that are being implemented by government agencies and found that delays were due to suspected corruption and nepotism, including lack of follow-up on project implementation.

He was speaking at a forum on “Stalled Government Projects: Causes and Solutions,” in Riyadh, which was attended by Minister of Municipal and Rural Affairs (MMRA) Abdul Latif Al-Sheikh and heads of several institutions from the public and private sectors.
Al-Muhaisin underlined the importance of continued cooperation between Nazaha and MMRA in the public interest, noting that Saudi Arabia has been committed to providing the best basic services for its citizens and expatriates in the country.

“This is apparent with the yearly state budget. Development and services projects, which seek to promote security, stability and decent living for citizens and residents, are often behind schedule,” he said.
Al-Muhaisin attributed project delays to lack of planning and transparency during the design stage, poor preparation of project documents, deficiencies in feasibility studies and other shortcomings in project reporting and implementation.

He said, “Among problems are using the same bid requirements and specifications for more than one project despite the differences between them; poor efficiency of the government agency’s technical supervision system; and non-participation of the branches of government in follow-up and supervision. There was also poor coordination among service agencies concerning the location of project work, a weak base of information supplied to authorities for infrastructure, and frequent changes in orders during the course of the project’s process.”

Other factors for project delays include expansion of the contract with subcontractors without the consent of the owner of the project, and not enforcing the government agencies’ measures to withdraw the project from the contractor.

He stressed the need to restructure the construction sector in the Kingdom in line with the current and future size of projects through studies and research in this area.
He suggested for the merger of the existing contracting companies, or work on the establishment of joint-stock companies with citizen participation in order to create a strong entity versed for the advancement of this vital sector.