OLMT project faces further delay

Officials say 94% of development work has been completed

LAHORE: The provincial government is likely to seek more time from the apex court as another deadline for the completion of civil works of the Lahore Orange Line Metro Train (OLMT) project has been missed.

Last month, a two-member bench of the Supreme Court of Pakistan had directed the provincial government to complete civil works by May 20 but the government has failed to achieve the target. According to officials working on the project, around 94% of development work of the project has been completed.  The government may seek more time from the court as the project has entered its final stage.

Responding to a question, a senior official working on the project said that to comply with the deadline set by the apex court earlier, the government has aimed to complete the project by July. However, in view of the remaining work, it is now being expected that the project will be completed sometime in August or September.

Except finishing and electro-mechanical work, civil structures, including laying of the rail track, have been completed. Last week, Chinese contractors, along with provincial government high-ups, successfully completed the first test run by running a train from Dera Gujran to Ali Town at the speed of 10-kilometres per hour. The test was conducted to gauge the entire length of the track and the efficiency of the train.

The Punjab government had signed the OLMT project with Chinese National Development Reforms Commission in May 2014. As per the original plan, the project was expected to be completed in December 2017. However, due to litigation on heritage sites along the metro train route and the lengthy land acquisition coupled with the relocation of dozens of decades old neighbourhoods, the project missed various deadlines.

Officials and contractors working on the project told The Express Tribune that after the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf government came into power, it didn't pay attention to the project. Contractors' payments were withheld and delayed. However, following the intervention of the apex court, the PTI government expressed a little interest in the project as a major development work had been completed and the project was near completion. The PTI government believed that the province has to pay a huge subsidy for running metro buses in three big cities.

Punjab Chief Minister Sardar Usman Buzdar had already sought proposals to decrease and make the operational costs of Lahore, Multan and Rawalpindi-Islamabad metro bus realistic. He had directed officials to form a committee, which will submit its recommendation to the government to cut operational and maintenance cost of the project.

The 27-kilometre metro train project is estimated to cost over $1.65 billion (Rs165 billion), which is being funded through a loan by China's Exim Bank. The project documents highlighted that around $1 billion will be directly transferred to Chinese contractors, CR-NORINCO, for procurement of the rolling stock while the remaining amount will be transferred to Pakistan for the construction of the track and provision of allied infrastructure.

The project is part of the city metro network and after completion, it will connect Raiwind, Multan Road, Mcleod Road, Lahore Junction Railway Station and the Grand Trunk Road. It will be the first line of the Lahore Metro, which is the country’s first mass rapid transit train system.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 24^th, 2019.