Blacklisted firm behind Claveria’s unfinished town hall project

By LITO RULONA
Correspondent

THE firm that bagged the controversial P34-million Claveria municipal hall project was blacklisted by a schools division of the education department in December 2013 because of poor performance.

In a three-page decision signed by Dr. Danilo Despi, Masbate Schools Division superintendent on Dec. 23, 2013, the firm EM Paule Construction and Trading was blacklisted for failure to comply and meet its obligation to finish a project on its target date.

Despi stated that EM Paule Construction failed to fulfill its duties and responsibilities under the original contract.

The decision was based on the recommendation of a Deped-Technical Working Group (TWG) that monitored and found out that no work was done by the contractor, and no material was available at the project site.

The same concerns and complaints have been repeated in Claveria town in Misamis Oriental where EM Paule Construction subsequently bagged the contract for the construction of a new town hall.

The Claveria project, given a contract budget of P34.941 million, was awarded to EM Paule Construction with Architect RD Gaula and Associates as a construction consultant.

On June 13, 2013, the Deped-TWG recommended the termination of the Masbate contract with EM Paule Construction. The firm, with office address at Payna Street, Veterans Village Project in Quezon City, had been contracted for nearly P25 million to build classrooms under the 2012 Basic Education Facilities Fund-Red and Black Projects.

In the Masbate project, the Deped decision on blacklisting showed that the firm committed fault by stoppage of work and abandonment without any prior notice to the concerned government agency.

It was learned that the firm appealed the decision but education officials stood firm, and terminated the whole contract due to the “unreasonable delay of the contractor to fulfill its obligation.”

In Claveria, local officials expressed concerns over the slow pace of the town hall construction project.

Barangay chairman Moisses Macabasa of Poblacion, Claveria, said he was worried the project would not be completed during the remaining months of the administration of town mayor Redentor Salvaleon.

The controversial municipal hall project is being funded through a P34-million loan from the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP), and the promise was that the construction of the new town hall would be completed in January.

Macabasa said the project should have been finished last month but there are indications that the project construction would remain slow.

Based on the public notice of the Commission on Audit (COA), the construction of the new Claveria municipal hall started on Jan. 25, 2015, and the completion date was Jan. 16, 2016.