They fired the auditor of the main project for the reconstruction of the Đurđevića Tara bridge because he discovered the designer's omissions

The contract on the revision of the main project for the reconstruction of the Đurđevića Tara bridge was terminated with the company "Geotechnics, Projects & Consulting" in December of last year with an informal explanation that it was hindering the preparation of project documentation, its director told "Vijesta" Ivan Ševaljević.

He states that he did everything exclusively in accordance with the rules of the profession, legal acts, project terms of reference and urban planning and technical conditions and that he pointed out omissions in the project. He also said that after that, a new suitable auditor was chosen without the legal tender procedure being carried out, but also that after a full eight months, the project documentation for the reconstruction of the bridge has not yet been completed and revised.

Ševaljević reacted after "Vijesti" published the article "Reconstruction of the Đurđevića Tara bridge starts in early 2024", which was published on Monday and in which he was mentioned as an auditor.

In the text, the director of the Directorate for Roads in the Ministry of Capital Investments (MKI) Miroslav Masic said that in the next two months, the revision of the main reconstruction project of the bridge on the Đurđevića Tara should be completed, as well as that after that the contractor would be chosen, which would start in 2024 and would last, according to estimates, up to a year and a half.

The reconstruction of one of the most important tourist attractions in Montenegro will be done with a donation provided by the People's Republic of China. "The company in which I am the executive director, "Geotechnics, Projects & Consulting", was awarded the audit of the conceptual design and the main project for the reconstruction of the bridge on Đurđevića Tara in a public tender announced by the Traffic Administration. The contract was signed on June 21.06.2021, 16.600. year and at a value of XNUMX euros without VAT. The project was done and probably still is done by the private company Institute for Construction from Podgorica, whose owners are seven regular professors of the Faculty of Civil Engineering in Podgorica or professors who are now retired. This company received the design work, which is incomparably more expensive than the audit, about ten times, directly without a tender procedure. This kind of practice is commonplace in Montenegrin construction circles, that major state jobs such as designing, revising the technical acceptance of the highway or some other major infrastructural project, such as the reconstruction of the railway, are carried out exclusively by the professors of the Faculty of Civil Engineering and through their private companies, mostly without a tender procedure. what could be said 'directly to the hands'", said Ševaljević.

He said that it is wrong that the company of which he is the director is still brought into the context of the auditor of this project documentation.

"The contract with our company was terminated on December 29, 12, with an informal explanation that it hindered the preparation of project documentation, even though our company and I personally did everything exclusively in accordance with the rules of the profession, legal acts and the project assignment and UT conditions, and within the deadlines prescribed by the contract with the Traffic Administration. In contrast, although the Institute of Civil Engineering (professors of the Faculty of Civil Engineering) is in the role of designer as a representative of the other party (Contractor from the Republic of China), the management of the Transport Administration found a solution for the slow development of project documentation and a delay of over a year in terminating the contract with the auditor !? and, according to the tried-and-tested recipe, introduce suitable auditors into the audit without conducting a legal tender procedure. As we can see, even after a full eight months, although they have an audit that looks favorably on the omissions we pointed out in the design phase, there is still no completed and revised project documentation for the reconstruction of the bridge. A similar situation, only with another company in the role of designer, happened with the famous project for the reconstruction of the Danilovgrad-Markovina road as well as the project for the reconstruction of the Most zeleni-Vuča road. "None of these projects has been brought to an end even though more than eight months have passed since the termination of the contract with our company in the role of auditor and the direct introduction of eligible auditors," Ševaljević said.

China donates money, so it got the right to choose the contractor and designer

The donation agreement between the Government of Montenegro and the People's Republic of China was signed in December 2020, before the election of the new Government, by the then Minister of Transport Osman Nurkovic and director of the Traffic Administration Savo Paraca.

It defined that China donates 7,05 million, but was given the right to choose the contractor and the author of the reconstruction project without tenders and procedures provided for by Montenegrin laws. The Chinese designer "China Railway Eryuan Engineering Group Co" has chosen a domestic partner, the Institute of Civil Engineering. The contract stipulates that China will select the contractor when the main project is adopted. It was also planned that the Chinese company would deliver the main reconstruction project four months after the signing of the contract, which has not yet been completed due to an omission in the documentation discovered by the now former auditor.

The contract stipulates that the Montenegrin side will appoint an auditor of the technical documentation, in accordance with domestic laws, so after the tender procedure, the company "Geotechnics, Projects & Consulting" was chosen as the auditor. Thus, Montenegro, that is, the Traffic Administration, could not even terminate the contract. with the designer even though he was late with the project and had defects, but only with the auditor who noticed these defects.