BAGUIO CITY – Mayor-elect Benjamin B. Magalong warned public works contractors with obviously defective projects that he will make sure that they will not be able to get future projects from the concerned government agencies and the local government once their implemented projects have been found to be substandard.
The incoming local chief executive raised observations on how poor the current contractors of public works projects in the city have implemented their projects which warrant appropriate action by concerned government agencies but it seems that no drastic actions are being taken to discipline erring contractors, thus, the existence of poorly implemented projects in the different parts of the city.
“We will make sure that contractors who will be awarded public works projects to implement will comply with prevailing standards in the implementation of their awarded projects. We will do all possible means within the ambit of the law to elevate the level of the implementation of projects because we never received contributions from contractors that is why we do not owe them anything,” Magalong stressed.
He expressed disappointment on the way public works contractors have been implementing their awarded projects which is obviously not in accordance to prescribed standards that is why he is wondering how such defective projects pass the required tests and are eventually paid by the government which is tantamount to waste of public funds.
According to him, even the workers of contractors do not have the mandated personal protective equipment like gloves, helmets among others to ensure that they are spared from the elements that could result to the putting in danger their safety considering that part of the contracts for the implementation of projects are the provision of protective equipment for the assigned workers.
Magalong claimed that he will seek the opinion of experts on the state of the numerous infrastructure projects that are being implemented by the public works department and the local government to ascertain their compliance to standards so that those contractors who will be discovered to have implemented poor quality projects will eventually be barred from being awarded future projects to implement so that the deserving contractors will be the ones to implement quality public works projects beneficial to the greater majority of the populace.
He admitted that based on his initial observations while going around the city’s barangays, there are newly implemented public works projects that are already scaling which is not supposed to be the case while there are other projects that have evident cracks that casts doubts on how the projects were prosecuted by the winning contractors.
The retired police official emphasized that it is high time that the implementation of the public works projects by concerned government agencies must level up pursuant to the prescribed standards and not the way contractors want to do their warded projects.
Magalong will be assuming the city’s mayoralty position by noon of June 3, 2019 after he was proclaimed by the city board of canvassers as the one who garnered the highest votes for the position during the May 13, 2019 mid-term elections.
By Dexter A. See