Chief Procurement Officer (CPO), Ti’alemasunu Dr. Mikaele Etuale was blunt and to the point when he faced a nearly two hour meeting of the House Government Operations Committee, this week.
Chairman Rep. Faimealeei Anthony Allen targeted unfinished projects which were begun during the end of the Lolo Lemanu Administration in his opening questions, the Special Education building at Pavaiai Elementary and the clubhouse at the golf course.
Ti’alemasunu said, there’s been a fourth change order for this project and every time they inspect it, there’s no sign of progress. He said, at one inspection, the Governor asked him about possible actions and his answer was that the Public Works Department (DPW) knows the remedy.
His recommendation was for the contractor to be held accountable for liquidated damages and he, as CPO, can terminate the contract, but Public Works has to initiate the action. However, up until now, PDW has not followed through. Instead of heeding his advice to terminate the contract, DPW has decided to give the contractor another chance.
The CPO said, its no longer an issue with the contractor but rather Public Works and pointed out that the victims are the kids. He said, the special education students are now crammed into a small room.
Regarding the clubhouse at the the golf course in Iliili, the CPO said that this was another project that was started at the end of the Lolo Administration but for over two years, there’s been no work on it. When he asks about the status of the project he’s told to wait for the contractor.
The contractor was not identified during the questioning and testimony of the CPO, but a report of ongoing projects that was distributed at the Public Works hearing last week listed the contractor, for both jobs, as Pentagon.
Earlier this week, House members were told by Department of Education (DOE) officials that the bottleneck on many school projects was the CPO not giving his approval.
This was vehemently disputed by Ti’alemasunu, who said that he had not received any paperwork from DOE about specific orders which the Fiapule raised.
For example, with the purchase of air conditioners for all the schools, he had recommended to the DOE Director that since here are ample suppliers of air conditioners on island, to parcel out the order so that each company would supply air conditioners to schools in the different districts.
DOE was to get quotes from 5 companies, but he said that he only received quotes from one company and two more came in recently. He’s still waiting for the other two.
