Tabu Butagira
14 October 2009
Kampala — National Social Security Fund contributors could pay an extra $35 million (Shs70b) for the construction of the multi-storey Pension Towers on Lumumba Avenue after the Fund's new board reportedly approved a revised construction cost from $75 million (Shs150b) to $110 million (Shs220b).
Daily Monitor has learnt that Mr Vincent Ssekkono, the board chairman, wrote to Finance Minister Syda Bbumba, on July 18, asking for a 'no objection' to implement the revised building plan that would spiral the bills upwardly.
Asked yesterday if she had endorsed the proposed changes, Ms Bbumba, who acknowledged receiving the July correspondence, said "Unless there is something wrong with the board's decision, I will uphold it."
This latest development could be disturbing to the more than 400, 000 Fund members anxious that the present $75 million construction cost of the Pension building, conceived in 2001, was already triple its initial cost of $25.79 million.
Building of the structure, planned to accommodate NSSF headquarters; Kampala and Mpigi offices and provide commercial space for rent commenced in April last year, but stalled after scores of construction workers died at the site when a section of the retaining wall collapsed on them on October 14, exactly one year today.
Since then, nothing has been done to raise the building which should have been built midway through, after professional bodies de-registered or suspended nearly a dozen engineers and architects on the project, indicted in a government investigation report.
Altered designs
The Prof. Jackson Mwakali-led Construction Technical Investigation Team (CTIT), discovered the contractors - Roko Construction Company - had, by the commencement of that actual construction, worked on designs altered three times, the last of which KCC as the local planning authority never approved.
It is understood that the final blueprint, which City Hall has reportedly now cleared and the new NSSF board wants the minister to give a nod to, comprises four levels of basement parking, two floors in the podium, a middle tower of 24 floors and two additional towers of seven floors each.
NSSF officials said last evening that they would only offer an update on the Tower development, whose paralysis over the last 12 months has raised concerns that the already-behind-the-schedule investment would hold up projected returns yet the bill of its construction could continue bulging due to increasing market prices of building materials.
It is also unclear how the work suspension would affect pay to the contractors and there is public disquiet that abandoning the scheme all together could bring more losses to workers than gains.
Reviewing investments
Separately, Mr Victor Karamagi, the NSSF public relations manager, said in a statement to our queries that: "The new Fund board is considering and reviewing all investment projects which are in the pipeline and those that are being reviewed include the Nsimbe and Temangalo housing projects."
He added: "Once the board has made a decision, it will be announced to the public. However, the board's priority is that all projects take off, are completed and become profitable."
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