The Education Ministry’s 2017 audit report reveals that demolition of old Dharumavantha School building likely to involved corruption. According to the audit report , contract was awarded to a company for demolition of the school building during October 2016 for MVR 1,494,600. The demolition work was to be finished within 60 days from the date of contract.
However, the party to which the project was awarded to, informed in a letter sent to the Education Ministry that the company would have to charge an extra MVR 1.1 million for the demolition of the southern wing of the school, claiming that the original contract did not include the demolition of south wing. This increased the total project cost to MVR 2,595,000. The contractor also informed that the project completion duration would increase to 90 days instead of 60 days.
Public Finance Act states that project costs can be increased by 10 percent at the most. However, the Education Ministry had agreed to the new cost proposed by the contractor with the permission of the Finance Ministry, which was 74 percent more than the original project cost.While the bid announcement and information sheets had clearly stated that the project involved the demolition of the entire school building, if the cost for the demolition of the south wing was not included in the proposed bid, it is negligence on part of the party that submitted the bid.
