Immediate steps needed to fulfill dream of suffering millions
Jatrabari is the main gateway to Dhaka city from the north eastern and south eastern parts of the country Everyday almost round the clock thousands of private cars, passenger buses, ambulances, trucks loaded with raw materials from the port city and with finished exportable items from the capital and various kinds of vehicles are passing through Jatrabari causing heavy jams for hours . Every year the number of vehicles passing through this point is increasing rapidly causing immense suffering of the incoming and outgoing passengers .It is said that very often ailing patients coming to the capital in ambulance succumbs to death as the ambulance gets stuck up in the vicious jam for 2-3hours.
Realising the gravity of the situation and to relief the suffering millions from the agony of the un-tolerable traffic jam, the Dhaka City Corporation took the initiative to construct the Jatrabari-Gulistan Flyover. DCC invited an international tender in this regard under Build,Own,Operate and Transfer(BOOT ) basis. After conducting necessary technical and financial evaluation along with competitive toll rate and concession period, Belhasa-Accom and Associates Ltd was found to be the most appropriate company for the construction of the flyover. The agreement was signed on 21st June,2005 and the project was inaugurated on 4th june,2006. As the implementation period was fixed to 03 years ,the project was supposed to be completed in 2009. It was the first BOOT project in Bangladesh. The concessionaire would provide all the finances required for the completion of the project. The cost of the project was estimated to be BDT670 crore. The project was also the first private sector participation in the infrastructure development of the country with FDI from the Emirates.
The concessionaire, Belhasa Accom and Associates Ltd ,a joint venture company formed between Belhasa International LLC of the United Arab Emirates(UAE) and Accom Engineering company Ltd. of Bangladesh procured a large number of highly expensive latest equipments to construct the flyover according to international standard.
Belhasa International is one of the leading construction companies in the UAE having a workforce of more than 5,000 employees. Established in Dubai, the company has achieved many milestones in the construction arena around the globe by undertaking a wide range of infrastructure projects including a significant number of elevated road projects, hotels, mosques, multi-story residential complex,etc.
After the inauguration, the concessionaire was engaged in the groundwork for the construction of the flyover. But unfortunately DCC issued a notice on ,2007 informing the cancellation of the agreement mentioning that the bank guarantee provided by the concessionaire as per rule of the agreement was not genuine . Belhasa – Accom denied this claim and was even ready to provide the guarantee in cash. The dispute was not solved as both the parties filed cases against each other and the concessionaire had to stop construction of the flyover. As a result the dream of the suffering millions was shattered. If not halted more than fifty percent of the project would have been finished by now. The completion of the flyover in 2009 as scheduled would result immense benefits for millions of people passing through Jatrabari like elimination of intolerable traffic jam at Jatrabari and Saidabad, reduction of travel time from the usual 2-3 hours to around 10 minutes between Jatrabari and Gulistan and easing significantly the traffic flow from and to as many as 30 districts which would eventually made a positive impact on the socio-economic development of the country.
Recently, a Thai-based company, Italian Thai Development Company has submitted a proposal for the construction of a 30 km elevated expressway in the Dhaka city to the Ministry of Communication. In the proposal the Thai company has quoted the cost of the flyover construction per km as Tk.257 crore It is observed that at this rate the cost of construction of the Jatrabari-Gulistan portion (8Km) of the elevated expressway comes around 2500 crore which is about four times than that of the cost mentioned by the Belhasa-Accom during their agreement with Dhaka City Corporation(DCC).Even then the vested group is trying to pursue some members of top-level authority to accept this proposal which will be a massive burden for the whole nation as the fund required will have to be collected from donors and must be paid with huge amount of interest.
As mentioned earlier Belhasa-Accom proposal being based on BOOT process with foreign direct investment from Emirates. it did not require any donor assistance and was not a headache for the tax -payers.
It may be mentioned here that the Emirates -based Belhasa International has already made substantial investment in another milestone project of DCC jointly with Accom Engineering , the 37-storied City Centre building which will emerge as the tallest building of Dhaka metropolitan city next year.
At present the FDI flow has heavily slowed down in the country. The revival of the Flyover project by the Concerned authorities will definitely encourage Belhasa to make more investment in Bangladesh which would be followed by other Middle East investors.
Considering these factors conscious citizens demand that the cancelled agreement of DCC with Belhasa-Accom should be revived immediately to fulfill the dream of about 75 million people(almost half of the population of the country) of Chittagong Division, Sylhet Division and Dhaka Division.
