Daily Times

The bigger, the more technical and the more delayed; the better. This is the formula for creating projects, which are designed to become financial guzzlers and technical maze, where finding when, how much and where the money went becomes almost impossible. Energy projects are ideal for this recipe. Infrastructural projects become layers of deceptive costing while transport projects are made for infinite escalation. This recipe clouds the truth, confuses the facts and complicates the assessments. By the time, audits and investigations reach a significant conclusion, governments have already changed; laws have been bent, and institutions have been tamed enough to declare it as a project non grata. The mega project is a win-win for all. The government loves it as it gives the involved authorities a huge room for resource redistribution from the public to personal accounts while the public loves it as they hope to see a new road or bus blitzing in advertisements, and the analysts concede that even if the money is not necessarily being spent prudently or on priority items it is still being spent on some public good.

If there ever remained a doubt on the fact that size gives a cushion for deception, the Auditor General’s report on Lahore Metro bus project substantiates this finding. The report has unearthed overpayments and losses worth millions of rupees in the construction of the Lahore Metro Bus project, which was completed in February 2013. The audit report shows overpayments of Rs 318.68 million, which include Rs 86.32 million on the account of the extra labour rate of pre-mixed carpeting, Rs 72.09 million on inadmissible pre-heating charges; Rs 39.84 million due to the inadmissible payment of surface rendering and finishing; Rs 32.11 million for the non-deduction cost of less used bitumen, who would know what these technicalities actually cost?

Nearly every project of any scale has become a completion and initiation failure. Take the case of Neelum Jhelum Hydropower Project. According to a Wapda spokesman, as per its revised PC-1, the cost of the project, which is now projected at Rs 416 billion from an initial estimate of Rs 84.55 billion; showing a mammoth jump of 392 percent. This, itself, should create an uproar in media and the parliament. However, to every question of how in the world can a project jump to almost 400 percent of the original cost; the answer is a technical explanation. The project that was supposed to start in 2002, got no funding till 2007; when the cost became very high. The original design was found to be deficient as 2005 earthquake necessitated additional work, the new cost was not approved, when it was approved there were no funds and so on and so forth. Yet, for years despite no work every citizen in Pakistan has been paying tax for this project in its electricity bill. Where the money goes is anybody’s guess.

Another on paper, “White Elephant” that even before its completion has made Civil Aviation bankrupt is the New Islamabad International Airport. The new airport, which was estimated to be completed at a cost of Rs 36 billion, has now crossed Rs 100 billion expense because of mismanagement and lack of the financial farsightedness of Civil Aviation Authority that the audit has pointed out. The audit report on the accounts of Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) for the year 2014-2015 explains the financial affairs of the new airport in Islamabad and has criticized the authority for not properly managing the mega project.

If you ever wanted an example of how to make a project a financial swamp, have a look at the famous Orange Metro train. Built on an initial astronomical cost of Rs 165 billion; the Orange Train has become a deep-sea money filling drill. After the inclusion of land acquisition cost, additional works and contingencies, the project will cost Rs 200 billion. As the environmental requirements pile up and design deficiencies are exposed, it has the potential of doubling up from its original price to Rs 300 billion.

The worst part of these cost escalations is that the parliamentary procedures under written in the constitution are not followed at all. The audit report on Lahore Metro bus clearly highlights irregularities to the tune of Rs1.55 billion in the procurement and contract management because the government did not get approval from ECNEC (the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council).

The danger of this mega mania is that when these projects become controversial and analysts classify them as failures the megalomania of the leaders make them their ego trip that must be operated at all costs. Nandipur power project is a classic example of inflated egos burning down taxpayer’s money to throw billions in a plant whose design, construction, fuel requirement was always unviable and technologically impossible. This obsession with fast and flashy projects has deprived 25 million children from education and 40 percent babies to remain stunted due to lack of nutrition.

Intent of the person commissioning the project is more important than the letter of intent signed for the project. When the intent is to serve the lust and egos of a few bigwigs, hiring of key people is done on cronyism. Nandipur was blessed to a bureaucrat who did not know the difference between furnace and diesel oil. Civil Aviation advisor Shujaat Azeem was the brother of an MNA and so on and so forth. This party of opportunists deviate standards, bend rules, bypass constitution, fudge costs, fake completion reports, over invoice payments, duplicate effort, and burn records. Is it a mere coincident that the expense record of motorway, National Debt retirement fund, LDA, Metro bus, Nandipur, Danish School, Neelum-Jhelum have all been burnt in strange fire accidents?

If you cannot defend them, burn them with a strategy that may have worked in the past but with software hackers and social media virality deleting unwanted records from human memories may become more and more difficult. This story of mega projects made for mega payoffs to serve mega egos has already caught the international media attention. The Economist recently published an article on “Pakistan’s misguided obsession with infrastructure” in which they clearly proved how these projects were not viable and only benefitting the rich and elite. The report says about CM Shehbaz Sharif, “He has lavished resources on endless sequences of over- and underpasses to create “signal-free” traffic corridors in Lahore, the provincial capital, that are of most benefit to the rich minority who can afford cars”. The theory is that these showcase projects give a false sense of development and win votes. However, as more mouths go hungry and more minds remain illiterate a brick and mortar approach to development may prove self-defeating.

The writer is a columnist and analyst and can be reached at andleeb.abbas1@gmail.com