By Sipho Masondo

The Livingstone Hospital upgrade for the 2010 Fifa World Cup has been placed in jeopardy after the contractor withdrew from the project due to non-payment by the Eastern Cape health department.

Ho Hup Construction, which won the R60-million tender to complete the first phase of the upgrade, cancelled the contract last week after the department failed to pay the company more than R7-million at the end of April.

The first phase includes the building of a new clinic, a new dentistry unit, a bridge, earthworks and roads.

Fifa granted South Africa the right to host the World Cup with the proviso that it upgraded trauma units and oncology centres at hospitals close to participating stadiums.

Livingstone Hospital is close to Port Elizabeth‘s new multi-purpose stadium near the North End Lake, which is nearing completion.

Ho Hup managing director Theunis Crouse on Monday said the company was now demanding close to R30-million from the department, which included loss of profit and other penalties.

He said the contract had been cancelled and the company would not move off the site until its account was settled in full.

After it received payment from the department, Crouse said Ho Hup would move off the site, and the department would have to get another company to complete phase one.

“Until they settle the final account we won‘t move. We will stay and if they give us a court notice to leave the site, we will defend it,” he said.

This has raised fears that the second phase of the work – the trauma unit and the oncology centre – which was supposed to have begun on April 1, will not be completed in time for the showpiece between June and July next year.

In March Ho Hup threatened to cancel the contract after the department failed to pay the company about R14- million for work done since January.

“We gave them 10 days to pay the contract and they paid us on the 10th day.

"In the middle of April we put them on terms again. They failed to pay on time and on April 30 we cancelled the agreement on the advice of lawyers.”

Crouse said the first phase of the upgrade should have been completed by December 5, but wasn‘t because of “bad planning” from project consultants Brinkman Ndayi McAll.

The consultants declined to comment and referred the matter to the department of public works which is managing the project on behalf of the health department.

Public works confirmed that the contract had been cancelled.

Project manager Francis Pama said the department was caught between Ho Hup and the health department.

“We are in a difficult situation. We are not the ones who pay. The issue is late payments by the department of health.

"I don‘t know why they take so long. We are concerned about delivery.”

He said he was confident recommended contractor WBHO would be able to complete phase two on time.

Port Elizabeth Hospital Complex facilities manager Solly Pretorius said Ho Hup would be paid by the end of the week.

“I don‘t know why they are not paid on time. The payments are processed in Bhisho.”

Source: The Herald