MPs put to task Chinese contractor over Hazina Towers project

The incomplete Hazina Trade Centre. [Elvis Ogina, Standard]

A Chinese contractor is on the spot over alleged fraudulent payments and the reduction of the proposed office block of

National Social Security Fund (NSSF) Hazina Trade Centre project in Nairobi.

The National Assembly Public Investment Committee, pressed representatives of China Jiangxi International Limited to explain why the office block was reduced from the initial 39 floors to 15 floors.

The Navakholo MP Emmanuel Wangwe led committee summed the contractor to shed light on the issues raised by the Auditor General in the NSSF accounts for the financial years 2019-2020 and 2020-2021.

With a design inspired by the image of a Maasai moran standing with his legs crossed and leaning on a spear, construction of the 39-storey tower started in 1997 and was to cost about Sh2 billion.

Standing at 180 metres upon completion, the tower would be the tallest building in Kenya and third in Africa after Carlton Centre in South Africa and Cairo Towers in Egypt.

And 27 years later, the Hazina Trade Centre is 15 floors with about two-thirds of the architectural vision shrunk to the bland form of the buildings around it.

The contractor said the project is complete and ready to be handed over to the NSSF.

However, the building located between Moktah Daddah and Monrovia streets in Nairobi’s Central Business District is yet again on the spot over fraudulent payments.

China Jiangxi International Limited Director Jimmy Ji

Wangwe wondered why the 15-storey building ended up costing more than the initially planned 36 floors, despite the project involving the elevation of an existing building.

He said that such a variation should not result in a 100 per cent cost increase.

"What made the 15 floors more expensive than building the revised 21 floors? Even if there were variations, it cannot be 100 per cent," said Wangwe.

The committee questioned the rationale behind the drastic reduction from 36 floors to 15 floors, especially since the work was in progress and the Bill of Quantities (BQs) was prepared for the 36 floors.

The committee sought to know if the BQs had to be revised due to the variation.

The committee demanded an explanation on why billions of shillings were paid for incomplete work.

But China Jiangxi International Limited Director Jimmy Ji told the committee they were on the site only to build and were not involved in the decisions on the variations.

"We are contractors and not involved in the decision-making of the variations. We are just on-site for construction purposes, and when the decision of variation was reached, we were building the 15th floor,” Mr Ji said.