Poor project implementation: Has gov’t finally found the cure?

Mbongeni Mguni | Sunday November 5, 2023 06:00

Transport and Public Works minister, Eric Molale, is confident that the answer to the government’s long-running project implementation woes has arrived. The veteran civil servant has more than four decades in the public service, climbing the ranks from the district level administration to becoming an economic planner, later the longest-serving Permanent Secretary to the President and finally several ministerial appointments.

Poor project implementation far precedes Molale’s entry into the public service and in fact, has arguably been the most important driver of public finance wastage and spending inefficiencies. Implementation challenges have dogged government for decades, costing the country billions of pula in direct and opportunity costs, but more importantly, denying citizens the services and forestalling their economic aspirations.

At its heart, poor implementation of projects not only means wasting the millions paid to consultants who draw up these plans, but also the potential benefits and opportunities to citizens such as access to electricity, water and other infrastructure, are equally lost in the wind.

The Transitional National Development Plan (TNDP), which outlines the projects the government is funding between now and March 2025, says the challenges around implementation include poor scoping, weak monitoring, capacity constraints and inaccurate costing of projects. They also include ineffective appraisal of projects, weak monitoring and evaluation, lack of coordination and fragmentation amongst authorities.

Quite critically, the minds behind the transitional NDP say the absence of accountability for implementation at the level of ministries, departments and agencies, is a challenge. Speaking to Mmegi recently, Molale, held up the government’s new development manager model as the solution to the long-running project implementation challenges.

“The development manager is a good delivery method when it comes to projects and as government, we have embraced it as the way to go,” he said. “It’s not new to the country but maybe we thought it was a once in a while model. It has been proven that this is the way to go,” he said.

Under the development manager approach, selected major public projects have been packaged and their implementation outsourced to private companies. At least 140 projects, all under the TNDP, have been bundled under the development manager model and will involve spending more than P13 billion in the next two years.

Last December, government selected nine firms, mainly engineering consultancies, as development managers, working with government’s Catalyst Project Team and reporting to a steering committee chaired by Vice President, Slumber Tsogwane.

The nine development managers have carved up the country into zones and projects which they will oversee through the appointment of private contractors, consultancies and others. Projects include hospitals, roads, schools, offices, prisons, stormwater drainage and others. Major works under the development manager model include the long-awaited Leather Industry Park, and the even more eagerly anticipated reconstruction of the Francistown-Nata-Maun road, which has been allocated a total of P2.4 billion in the TNDP. Molale, who is the deputy chair of the steering committee, is seen as the brains behind ushering in the development manager model. He appears to confirm this view as he easily narrates the country’s history with the development manager model and his involvement with the projects over the decades.

“The first I can remember was the Shashe complex, which was a menu of projects that had to be done at the same time by the government when the Selebi-Phikwe copper mines were being developed,” Molale says.

“We had to build Shashe Dam, develop a power station at the mouth of the mine, develop a township from virgin land as well as build hospitals and schools. All this had to be delivered at the same time so that by the time mining operations were ready, all the infrastructure would be operating.

“Through the development manager model, all this was delivered on time, within cost and of quality.”

Molale said the country’s second development manager model project involved the accelerated land servicing programme, which included urban areas and semi-urban areas such as Gantsi, Kasane and Sowa.

“I was also involved in a smaller sized development manager project which was the 400 houses built behind Game City in Gaborone in the 1990s. “There was no housing for civil servants at the time and I asked the developers to do this on an Engineering, Procurement, Construction (EPC) and handover basis.

“They delivered that within 12 months; bought the land, serviced it, built the houses and gave us keys in 12 months.

“I was later involved in yet another development manager project being the Cut 8 expansion at Jwaneng Mine when I was the chairman of Debswana.”

Proponents of the development manager model, such as Molale, argue that its success lies in being able to de-risk public projects for government. When government awards public works to contractors, it remains carrying the financing risk, with minimal cover from defects notification periods as well as Liquidated and Ascertained Damages (LADs) clauses. The development manager model shifts the risk from being solely on government, to the private sector partners. Typically, development managers earn a fee on completed projects and thus it is in their financial interest to ensure these are finalised within time, scope, budget and quality. “In all government projects before the development manager model, 99.9% of the risk has been on government,” Molale told Mmegi. “When it’s like that, who would care to make sure that they don’t get taken to task?

“You have the example of the Boatle road, where P1.2 billion was spent and a few days after the expiry of the LADs, that bridge collapsed.

“Those who would have been held responsible and accountable went away scot free. With the development manager model, we apportion the risk so that those who do the work for government must also pay. If this risk is apportioned well, people come to their senses and know that ‘if I do anything mischievous here, I will be held accountable.’”

Molale says government has agreed that beyond the TNDP, the development manager model will be used in the upcoming National Development Plan 12. In fact, the public service veteran would want to see the model stretch further and incorporate elements of Public Private Partnerships (PPP).

Molale sees an opportunity for development managers to not only oversee projects in terms of EPC, but also lead how these can be financially packaged.

The dualisation of the A1 highway, for instance, will involve toll roads, meaning whichever contractor is selected for the project, can go beyond EPC and recoup their project costs from the tolls paid, a PPP type of arrangement. For President Mokgweetsi Masisi, the development manager model ticks boxes in his transformation agenda as well as the Mindset Change campaign. The two-year TNDP is the dipstick on whether the model can be applied to the longer NDP12, which is currently being formulated.

“The development manager model is consistent with our promises in the ruling party’s 2019 manifesto on infrastructure, as well as the Reset Agenda, in changing the way we do things as we drive towards a performance culture,” the President said at a recent contract signing ceremony for development managers.

When he delivers his State of the Nation Address, Masisi is expected to highlight the development manager model as an example of the changes his administration is making in addressing the country’s challenges.