The Zamfara State Government has revoked N113m contract invested in the excavating of the Gusau Dam due to the inability of contractors to meet the contractual provisions.The contractors were also directed to refund the sum of N24m collected as mobilisation fee.The Commissioner for Water Resources, Alhaji Abdullahi Tsafe, told the News Agency of Nigeria in Gusau on Wednesday that the government was forced to revoke the contract following the inability of the company to meet the agreement. Tsafe said, "After a careful study and analysis of the level of work done, we concluded that the contractor does not have the capacity and competence to undertake a job of such magnitude and therefore terminated the contract."The State Executive Council, in its meeting of October 31, approved the revocation of the water barrage contract and we have conveyed the action to the contractor," he added. He noted that the recommendation for termination was decided by the technical committee set up to ascertain the capacity of the contracted company. According to him, part of the findings of the committee was the contractors flagrant default in conducting hydrographic survey to ascertain the quantity of water that could be reserved in the dam and how excess water could be discharged if the need arose. "We will demand a refund of N25m from the contractors, being the mobilisation fee the firm collected for the commencement of the work," Tsafe stressed. Tsafe said the government would not accept shoddy jobs from contractors so as to ensure that whatever money was spent on a particular project was justified and the public got value for it. According to him, the state government will spend about N8bn to improve the supply of potable water to nine local government headquarters across the state. The affected areas are Mafara, Maradun, Tsafe, Kauran Namoda, Anka, Gummi, Maru, Bungudu and Zurmi, among others. The commissioner said phase one of the projects had begun in Tsafe, Kauran Namoda, Maradun and Mafara, and was expected to be completed in the next six months while the phase two would start immediately after the completion of the first phase. He said the state capital had been given special attention in the governments water expansion project so that it could provide about N9m gallons per day on its completion before the end of 2011. Tsafe added that the state government was considering re-introducing payment of monthly water charges by users so as to appreciate governments efforts.
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