Rampant corruption in Bangladesh's Roads and Highways Department is to blame for the dreadful state of much of the country's road network, watchdogs and academics say
DHAKA (TrustLaw) – Bidding for a government contract in Bangladesh can be a matter of life or death, literally.
Pitched battles frequently erupt between rival contractors, who are backed by political parties and their thugs. Newspapers are filled with stories of gun fights, tender boxes seized by gangs and government offices torched on the day bids are submitted for contracts .
This week 45 people were injured, four critically, in the north central town of Sirajganj when rival bidders fought on the deadline day to block each other from submitting tenders for a 1.8 million taka ($21,796) earth-moving contract. The conflict spilled into the streets and stores were looted. Police used shot guns, baton charges and 16 rounds of tear gas before they called for help from a neighbouring police force to break up the mob and regain control of the town.
Ten people were injured a few weeks earlier and the police station set on fire in the northern town of Lalmonirhat when members of the ruling party, the Awami League, fought rivals for a contract to collect bridge tolls. Police fired tear gas and charged with batons to break up the battle, and the police station was set on fire.
The clashes are especially common in Bangladesh’s road construction sector.
“It’s big corruption. The roads and highway division of the government is a sink in the sea of corruption,” said Prof. Muinul Islam of Department of Economics, University of Chittagong.
Government after government has used political patronage to award everything from jobs to lucrative public works contracts in transportation, utilities, earth works to government supplies, anti-corruption organizers say.
Railway Minister Suranjit Sengupta resigned amidst a media uproar in September after his driver arrived at a border police station and handed over Tk 7.4 million in cash (US $89,600), saying the money was taken in bribes by the minister’s office from prospective railway recruits. Sengupta has denied the charges.
The biggest construction scandal currently is over a bidding conspiracy involving a Canadian firm for the $2.9 billion Padma Bridge road and rail project, a massive river crossing to connect the southwestern part of the country with the poorer northeast. The World Bank said it had “credible evidence” of high-level corruption among Bangladesh government officials and has temporarily suspended its funding until the concerns are addressed.
Construction contracts too often are awarded to businesses unqualified to perform the work, which then is handed to a series of subcontractors, critics say.
“They grab the job using political influence, and later hand over the work to others, pocketing a major portion of the money. One project changes hands several times, so at the end there remains almost nothing for the road construction and repairs,” said Islam.
The result is shoddy construction. In the southwestern city of Jessore, for example, the Roads and Highways Department in fiscal year 2010-2011, carried out maintenance on three roads at a cost of Tk 3.8 million (US $45,837). Within a few months of the work being completed, the roads were rutted and potholed again, in no better condition than before the contract. Amid allegations of extremely sub-standard work, the Jessore Municipality Corporation took the rare step of forcefully stopping the work.
Controlling corruption is made more complicated by the funding structure. Bangladesh has 20,947 kilometres of roads. More than half of these are local district roads, 3,478 km are national highways and 4,221 km regional highways. The Roads and Highways Department with a budget for the current fiscal year of Tk 24 billion (US $289 million) has primary responsibility for construction and for regular maintenance of national routes.
The Local Government Division has a significantly larger budget of Tk 59.67 billion (US $719.7 million) in fiscal year 2012-13 for constructing and maintaining rural road infrastructure. The division pays for the work through allotments of wheat or rice to the contractor, who sells the grain in the local market to raise the money to pay for the roadwork.
Executive Director of Transparency International in Bangladesh Iftekhar Zaman told TrustLaw the Roads and Highways Department is widely known as the most corrupt among government agencies with little accountability.
“The major portion of budgeted money for roads is abused. In most cases work is carried out by sub-contractors, which means a third or fourth party, which is a systemic weakness,” he said.
“The people (engineers) who are supposed to ensure the quality of the works never get punished for their mistakes due to a culture of impunity which deepens the problem,” Zaman said. “Had a handful of the budgeted money been spent on the roadwork, the roads would not have become so rundown so quickly.”
The dilapidated state of the roads causes major headaches during the six-day Muslim festival of Eid-ul-Fitr, when millions of city residents return to their villages to celebrate with their families. This August the government made some makeshift repairs ahead of celebrations, but to little avail. A lorry overturned on one major highway slowing traffic for the whole day. Bus schedules completely collapsed. People were stranded after a day’s travel and conducted their religious prayers on the roadside. Desperate to get home, men risked their lives by clambering atop bulging train carriages. Outraged letters flooded the newspapers.
The communications minister recently ordered the Roads and Highways Department to complete all road repairs nationwide before the second largest religious festival Eid-ul-Azha, in the last week of October. He also urged local political leaders to prohibit roadside stalls and markets alongside the highways that cause traffic jams.
The military-backed caretaker regime in 2007 and 2008 took some steps to expose chronic corruption. At the government’s urging, 448 officials confessed to taking bribes before the Truth and Accountability Commission, including some 42 officials from the Roads and Highways Department. Top officials admitted earning huge sums, though the exact amounts were not disclosed. Despite the admissions, they were given amnesty and kept their jobs.
Corruption grew worse under the current government, and only after a huge media outcry in September 2011 were 17 officials from the Roads and Highways Department suspended.
The Chief Engineer of the Local Government Engineering Department Wahidur Rahman in an interview with TrustLaw blamed a funding shortage for roads in Bangladesh that are not constructed or repaired to high standards. His department builds roads to last for 10 years, he said. “Yes, people who are involved in supervision have to ensure quality for the longevity of roads.”
While Rahman admitted that sub-contractors often carry out the work, he said: “But we do not officially recognise them.”
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