Deadline given to canal cleanup project

The HCMC government has set a deadline for completion of a foot-dragging project to rehabilitate the Nhieu Loc-Thi Nghe Canal basin.

Speaking at a meeting on Wednesday with the HCMC Environmental Sanitation Project management unit, city vice chairman Nguyen Thanh Tai urged the project to be completed before the year-end though some packages had fallen behind schedule.

A report on the project’s progress, Package 10 for improving the Nhieu Loc-Thi Nghe Canal is 66% complete due to the incompetence of the main contractor China State Construction Engineering Corporation (CSCEC). Meanwhile, most other construction packages are almost finished.

The project management unit is seeking other contractors and preparing legal procedures to terminate the contract with CSCEC to speed up work on Package 10.

As for Package 10C for dredging the canal, which is also moving at a snail’s pace, a leader of the project management unit said only 80,000 cubic meters of sledge out of a total of 781,600 cubic meters has been dredged.

This package can only be put on fast track after another contractor is chosen to replace the existing one.

Funded by the World Bank, the project is designed to control flooding in the canal basin, collect wastewater to treatment plants through a new sewer system and improve the ecological environment along the canal.

The project’s total capital is US$316.8 million, with ODA capital accounting for US$294 million. Signed on July 5, 2001, the credit agreement between the WB and the city will expire by the year-end.

Tags: Nhieu Loc-Thi Nghe Canal