Portoviejo
The Ministry of Transportation and Public Works (MTOP) won the legal action that the company Consermin had filed so that the company in charge of guaranteeing the execution of the work of the Manta-Colisa road does not deliver the payment of about 22 million dollars from two insurance policies for this work, which the national government unilaterally declared to end the relationship with the aforementioned company.
However, the same company that demanded that the guarantee money not be disbursed again issued an appeal on the judicial ruling of the Multicompetent Judicial Unit of the Montecristi canton. Yuber Molina, undersecretary of zone 4 of the MTOP, indicated that this appeal, according to lawyers, would no longer have effect in a case already resolved.
“We are waiting for things to turn out in favor of the institution to proceed to contract all the works that are on the Manta-Colisa road,” the official declared.
The work of the 27 kilometers of the Manta-Colisa highway initially cost more than 83 million dollars financed with the Solidarity Law created after the April 2016 earthquake, and the signing of the contract was registered on March 30 of 2017, and the intention of the Government of that time (Rafael Correa) was that it be delivered in September 2019.
Judicial litigation hinders the progress of works on the Manta-Colisa road
This road connects the cantons of Manta, Montecristi and Jaramijó, and would allow a greater expansion of the peripheral network of these cities. But currently the road is abandoned, with a work progress that does not exceed 55%, in a large part without lighting, and due to the lack of signage, traffic accidents have already been reported, which have generated at least in the last two years some 15 deaths due to road accidents in most of the sections of this route.
In July of last year, after the death of a person, authorities such as the municipality of Manta, CNEL-Manabí and the undersecretary of Zone 4 of the MTOP, proceeded to locate signage and in some sections improve the electrification system.
“It is not optimal, I wish we could do more or we had the competence and the resources to solve right now the insecurity that this road means for all of us who circulate there,” Agustín Intriago, mayor of Manta, said last year.
Molina said that with the receipt of the nearly 22 million from the guarantee, they will be enough to complete the work, despite the fact that at the beginning it was said that to start a new contract that would allow the completion of the Manta-Colisa highway, 30.1 millions of dollars.
Sections of the Manta-Colisa highway intervene after a person died in a traffic accident
Molina specified that the price of 30.1 million dollars was maintained as a reference because some additional extensions had been made and had already been sent to Quito, but that would no longer be considered in the work that is intended to be done with the hiring of a new company to complete the disputed work that is currently abandoned.
Even the Minister of Transport and Public Works, Marcelo Cabrera, pointed out weeks ago that there was the possibility of creating a toll charge on that route.
“It is not that (toll collection) is ruled out, but that with that money we would be able to carry out these works,” Molina stated. (I)
Source: Eluniverso
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