A Chinese contractor who was engaged to rehabilitate the Maramba stadium by the PF regime is asking for K4 million before vacating the facility.
According to a source, the contractor who has a few workers residing at the stadium in a prefabricated housing unit has vowed not to allow FAZ to move on site.
FAZ is supposed to rehabilitate Maramba stadium, among four others, under the FIFA Forward Project because the contract is still active despite works having stalled as far back as 2017.
Four other facilities in Kasama, Mansa, Chipata and Solwezi have had contractors move on site to commence the FIFA funded rehabilitation programme.
“The contractor wants K4 million before the company can vacate the stadium next to Maramba Market,’’ said the source. ‘
’The contractor has not completed the works that were supposed to be done, the dressing rooms are not complete, there is no electrification for the sports media stands and the terraces are not roofed. There are also four spotlight slabs that have been built but the spotlights have not been erected.
“When contacted, Livingstone City Council public relations officer Marvin Mukela referred all queries to Southern Province sports officer Chisenga Kasolo.
“I was talking to the director of engineering; he says the only hiccup why FAZ can’t move in to rehabilitate the stadium is because the precious contract is still active, so they can only start when he leaves the site,’’ explained Mukela. ‘
’If you can get in touch with Kasolo, the provincial sports officer, he can highlight more of the contractor who is there. Only when the contractor leaves that is when we can move in, but we don’t know how far they have gone. As you may be aware that that contract was under the ministry of sports and not under the council, we are also getting feedback from there.”
When called, Kasolo responded via Short Message Services (SMS) requesting this author to send him a text.But by press time he had not responded to a query sent to him via WhatsApp as well as SMS.
[Edwin Mbulo, The Mast]
