CONSTRUCTION work on the new Solomon Islands National Provident Fund (SINPF) commercial property investment dubbed as ‘SOLCHO’ has been temporarily suspended to allow for an independent engineering review on its foundation.
This was confirmed by SINPF Management in a statement issued on Wednesday 25th June. This was in response to media allegations surrounding the project that have been circulating via the social media and in the print media.
“We are obliged to respond to the allegations circulating via social media and print media recently on the implementation of our new commercial property investment known as SOLCHO,” the statement said.
To correct the allegations, SINPF had confirmed that it has not terminated AJ Enterprises Ltd construction contract for the SOLCHO project.
The management further added, it did not terminate FMC Pacific (SI) Ltd contract for Project Management and Supervision.
“FMC has performed their scope of services as required under their project management contract with the SINPF Board.”
SINPF further confirmed that a review on the geotechnical engineering and construction issues related to the building’s foundation is underway with the engagement of Kramer.
“Construction Works have been temporarily suspended to allow for independent engineering review of construction works and documents as well as sorting engineering issues particularly geotechnical engineering and construction issues with the designed piles for the building’s foundation,” the Fund said in the statement.
Kramer Asia Pacific (KAPAC) has been tasked for this engineering and construction peer review, the statement added.
It assured that construction works will resume as soon as the peer review task is completed and based on the findings and recommendations from KAPAC.
SINPF also clarified that it won’t speak for AJ Enterprises Ltd on their dealings with their bankers.
However, the Fund confirmed providing a payment of $15million to AJ Enterprise as its obligation towards the contract.
“However, we can confirm that SINPF made a contract payment of SBD15m which is secured as required under contract conditions.”
SINPF said, it looks forward to the result of the engineering review so that construction can resume as soon as possible.
Meanwhile, a lot of SINPF members are concerned with the deal and have expressed their views through the social media.
