From all indications, it seems like the CDC government has a hidden interest in East International, a building material store turned construction company, evident by its persistent effort to award the company the lucrative but technical RIA Highway road construction contract.
The RIA Highway construction is funded through the Government of Liberia’s Road Fund, which was enacted into law by the National Legislature in 2017 by the Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf administration. The Road Fund initiate was intended to raise US$15 million—US$20 million each year by adding 30cents to each gallon of petroleum product sold in Liberia. Gracefully for Liberia, USAID agreed to match any amount that the government would generate, only if the money was used for road maintenance and not for the construction of new roads.
However, when the CDC administration came to power, it began misusing the Road Fund money, and USAID pulled out of the agreement last year and closed its office at the Ministry of Public Works. This was no lesson for the government to learn, as it is now transferring the money generated from the addition of US30cents to each petroleum product to East International in order to start work on the RIA Highway.
The agreement between East International and the government is that the construction company will pre-finance the road by securing a loan that the government will stand for as a guarantor.
In addition to that, the Minister of Public Works, Mabutu V. Nyepan, has transferred nine (9) of the ministry’s engineers to work for East International while they are on government payroll. Also, he has turned over some of the ministry’s heavy-duty equipment to the company, to be used for the construction.
East International is located on the S.D. Cooper Road, opposite the SKD Sports Complex. It was established in 2013 as a building material store.
East International quickly changed from a building material store to a construction company between 2013—2014. They received their first road contract from the Deputy Minister of Public Works, Victor Smith, for the construction of the Gay Town road, Old Road.
After construction of 50% of the 1.5mile Gay Town Road, the engineer from Public Works put a halt to the road project because East International knew absolutely nothing about road construction.
The second road project/contract that East International received from the Ministry of Public Works, this time directly from the Minister of Public Works himself, Gyude Moore, was the Redemption Road behind the BTC Barack. Again a stop order had to be placed on the road by the resident engineer from Public Works because the road was too slippery, the curve going up the hill was too narrow, allowing only one vehicle from the opposite lane to bend the curve at a time.
The third road order or contract that was given to East International was the Gbanga Broad Street, Bong County. Again, the engineer assigned to the road had to put a stop order on the road project because East International was using smooth sand to mix the concrete. They were also mixing the concrete with red mud.
East International knows absolutely nothing about road construction and has never successfully completed a road project. During the stay order placed on the Gay Town Road project, the engineer advised that they (East International) should go and monitor the road being constructed by a Liberian firm from the Tubman Boulevard to the Twelfth Houses, ELWA intersection. While the Liberians were constructing the road, a group of Chinese and their Liberian partners went and spied on the Liberian road project to perfect their work. The contract in question was given to a Liberian company by the National Social Security and Welfare Corporation (NASSCORP).
During the end of the Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf administration, the Minister of Public Works, Gyude Moore, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Emmanuel Nuquay, and Bong County Representative and Chairman on Public Works, Henry Yallah, with the expressed approval of President Johnson-Sirleaf, conspired to give East International 35 feeder roads.
The bill was passed, with Representatives Solomon George, Acarous Moses Gray, Munah Pelham-Youngblood and Bhofal Chambers objecting to awarding East International, which had no knowledge of road construction, such lucrative contracts.
East International was given the concession rights to construct 35 feeder roads and the necessary authority to source US$58.9 million (fifty eight million nine hundred thousand United States dollars), with the Liberian Government standing as the guarantor of the loan.
The funds in question, US$58.9 million, was to be in the country by November 2017 but unfortunately for East International they were unable to raise the funds under the agreement, but was able to take a US$25 million (twenty-five million United States dollars) loan from a Chinese bank in March 2018.
One is left to wonder why the CDC lawmakers, in persons of Representatives Bhofal Chambers who is currently the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Solomon George, the current Chairman on Youth and Sports, and Acarous Moses Gray, the current Chairman on Maritime and Co-Chairman on Executive, are silent, knowing fully well that East International has absolutely no capacity to construct such a road. Today the CDC is in leadership and the representatives who were shouting the loudest are now silent relative to the ills being meted out against the Liberian people.
It can be recalled that Montserrado and Margibi counties’ Senators, Abraham Darius Dillon and Oscar Cooper, in a press conference on February 25, 2020, said the Liberian Senate did not concur with the House of Representatives on any contract between the Government of Liberia (GOL) and East International, as claimed by Representative Gray. Representative Gray at the time boasted on OK FM that East International was awarded contract that was ratified by the National Legislature.
The two senators explained that during the time President George Weah recalled the Legislature in December 2019, the President was seeking for legislative advice through a letter and not a contract on the East International. The letter in question, according to them, was not a contract, as purported by Representative Gray and Senator Saah Joseph. Senators Cooper and Dillon are demanding the Secretariat of the Senate and the Senate leadership, especially Senator Joseph, who chairs Senate Executive Committee, to provide record for which the decision was made. They challenged the Senate to make the voting record public so that the public is able to judge if the Legislature acted on the instrument.
Senator Cooper, a former Chair on the Senate Committee on Public Works, revealed that at the time he chaired the committee, his committee established that East International was not credible and did not have the funding and expertise to construct a road. According to him, as Senator of Margibi, he is not against development, especially road construction, which his citizens will benefit from, but he is against illegal things and the construction of substandard roads. He challenged those praising the company to bring a proved record of standard roads constructed by them.