Many projects do not have proper feasibility studies
The government has endorsed 329 projects in last nine and a half months at a total cost of Tk 3.61 trillion, which is the record highest in a calendar year in terms of number and volume of allocations.
A good number of these projects have been taken on political consideration ahead of the upcoming national election, insiders said on Friday.
The total cost of the projects is more than double of Tk 1.73 trillion outlay of the current Annual Development Programme (ADP).
Officials and analysts said timely financing of these approved projects remains uncertain, as Tk 3.61 trillion funds will be required within a span of three to four years of the project execution cycle.
The government endorsed 185 development projects at an aggregate cost of Tk 2.44 trillion in the last five months (June-October). During January-May period of the current calendar year, the government also had approved 144 projects at total cost of Tk 1.17 trillion.
A senior Planning Commission official said: "The government has endorsed 62 development projects in last three ECNEC meetings within a span of nine days in this month. Most of the projects are alleged to be politically motivated."
Development analysts said the government is trying to attract voters by taking the development projects without doing feasibility studies, in many cases.
Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC), headed by the Prime Minister (PM), approved 17 projects at Tk 142 billion cost at its last meeting on October 11.
On October 9, ECNEC also endorsed 20 projects, the record highest in one meeting, at a total cost of Tk 325.25 billion.
Out of these 37 projects, the government approved at least eight projects for construction of rural roads and bridges by Local Government Engineering Department (LGED).
Besides, some other less important and less priority projects were also endorsed at the last two ECNEC meetings, insiders said.
A senior Planning Commission (PC) official said they could not scrutinise many projects properly, as they had to approve those within a short period without checking their feasibility and viability.
He said Planning Commission approved a project this month within three working days after its receipt. The ministry concerned sent the project following pressure from a powerful minister.
Development analyst Dr Mirza Azizul Islam told the FE that approving such a large number of projects within a short span of time is politically motivated ahead of the national election.
"The government will not be able to finance the projects in time. Most of these will not be ultimately completed within their implementation period. So, their time and cost will overrun."
The projects will neither be feasible, nor their outcome will be ensured, he opined.
Dr Ahsan H. Mansur said since the government is aggressively approving projects just before the election, it means most of these are politically motivated.
"The projects will not be executed before the election. But some political leaders, businessmen, bureaucrats and others concerned will be benefited from these. And taxpayers' money will be wasted."
The quality of the projects will be compromised, viability will not be ensured and ultimate outcome will not be achieved, he added.
However, a recent inter-ministerial meeting held at the planning division, with planning minister A H M Mustafa Kamal in the chair, took a serious note of the issue, and asked all ministries and agencies to conduct the studies before undertaking any project over Tk 250 million.
The meeting was organised to devise implementation strategy of ADP (Annual Development Programme) for fiscal year 2018-19, and approve new projects.
In the meeting, secretary to the Implementation Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED) Mofizul Islam said as projects are taken up without conducting feasibility studies, it was noticed that new items or working areas are included in the approved projects and their implementation costs go up significantly.
"As a result, projects are not implemented in time and face obstacles," he said.
Mr Islam underscored the need for making cost estimation of projects following public procurement rules, and regular close monitoring by high-ups of ministries, departments and implementing agencies.
Senior secretary of the planning division Ziaul Islam in the meeting said though the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) asked authorities not to take up large projects without conducting feasibility study, many ministries and departments frequently prepare projects violating the directive.
"To ensure the optimum use of limited resources we need to take up projects based on study outcome," he said.
Mr Islam also said in many cases, even after issuing purchase orders under approved projects, the contract price is also being changed.
He said the Prime Minister at a recent ECNEC meeting also asked all not to bring unnecessary changes in projects and raise project implementation costs.
But that is happening very often that needs to be stopped for taking well development plan, the senior secretary noted.
Additional secretary of the finance division Habibur Rahman told the FE amending projects several times and raising their costs have become a common phenomenon and the trend is on the rise.
"We have recognised the problem, and discourage people from doing this," he said.
Asked what could be the solution, Mr Rahman said that ministries and departments had to be more careful while taking up projects, to avoid such changes and implementation delays.
"The feasibility and technical studies also need to be conducted efficiently, and follow them properly at the project implementation stage," he noted.
He underscored the need for paying sufficient attention to project designing so that no amendment is needed at the implementation stage.
Another official at the Ministry of Finance told the FE that the development partners were also unhappy with the frequent amendments to project features and implementation costs.
Even, in many cases, it was noticed that projects taken with technical assistance from development partners, also see cost increase at different stage of their implementation, he said.
- The Financial Express/ Oct 21,2018
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