Speaking to a Tien Phong reporter, Mr. Nguyen Thanh Son – Director of the Vietnam Expressway Operation and Maintenance Corporation (VEC O&M) – said the unit is temporarily assigned to manage, operate and maintain expressways such as Mai Son – National Highway 45 (NH), NH45- Nghi Son, Nghi Son – Dien Chau since June last year.
However, after nearly a year of operation, the project investors (project management boards under the Ministry of Transport – MOT) have not yet inspected, accepted and paid for operation and management services for businesses. This makes it very difficult for businesses to maintain operations.
According to Mr. Son, currently the expressways do not have toll booths, so businesses must arrange staff to be on duty at checkpoints to prevent motorbikes or overloaded vehicles from entering the highway.
“Each junction needs 6 people on duty 24/24 hours a day, while the business is having to arrange people at 6 junctions. For the employees’ salaries alone, the business has to spend about 300 million VND/month, since last year until now. Not to mention the operation, safety and environmental sanitation work on the entire route, which costs even more, while no payment has been received from the investor”, said Mr. Son.
VEC O&M said it is having to pay hundreds of millions of VND each month to operate and manage expressways, but for nearly a year now has not received payment from the investor.
VEC O&M leaders said they have sent documents requesting the Thang Long Project Management Board, Project Management Board 2 and Project Management Board 6 (Ministry of Transport) to organize a meeting soon to resolve and address the problems.
“If the investors do not respond to resolve the above issues, the business will consider withdrawing all personnel, equipment, machinery and hotline phone numbers from the expressway from April 29th. Currently, the business cannot continue to carry out the management, operation and maintenance of the expressway sections due to financial difficulties”, said Mr. Son.
After investigation, it was found that the reason why investors have not been able to inspect, accept and pay for operation and maintenance costs for the temporary management businesses is due to a mechanism problem in determining the source of funds for payment during the provisional operation period. Previously, Decree 46 specified the source of funds during the period of handover to businesses for temporary operation, but later Decree 06 was issued without adding to it.
A representative of the Vietnam Road Administration said that it is requesting the Project Management Boards to complete the dossiers and hand over the routes to the Administration. After that, the Administration will conduct a tender to select qualified operation and maintenance units. When a winning bidder is selected, the Administration will consider using state funds to pay for the units.
According to the Vietnam Road Administration, it is expected that the unit will conduct the tender in May and from July 1st there may be an official contractor.
Earlier, the Vietnam Expressway Technical Services Joint Stock Company (VEC E) – a unit temporarily operating the Phan Thiet – Dau Giay expressway – reported that it has not been paid for operation costs by the Thang Long Project Management Board (investor) for nearly a year, amounting to over 10 billion VND.
This has meant the business has not been able to pay salaries and insurance policies for its employees, or pay the electricity bills for lighting on the expressway. A consequence of this is that a power company cut the power on the expressway for 5 minutes.
The Thang Long Project Management Board has now completed the dossier to hand over the Phan Thiet – Dau Giay Expressway to the Vietnam Road Administration, expected at the end of April. After the handover, the Vietnam Road Administration will conduct a tender to select a unit to manage and operate the project.
