Many telecommunication projects lacked feasibility, transparency: Evaluation committee  

Huge government projects lacking proper stakeholder consultation, feasibility, transparency and monitoring saw cost escalation and implementation delays in the past fifteen years and that deprived people of timely benefits, found a Posts and Telecommunications Division's (PTD) four-member evaluation committee formed by the interim government on 22 August.

The committee, evaluating nearly 50 projects, including over a dozen for the Directorate of Posts, submitted a 63 page report to the Posts, Telecommunications and Information Technology Advisor Md Nahid Islam earlier this week.

The Awami League government over the 2009-2024 period, spent around Tk40,000 crore for the projects and their outcome remained a question for years.  

The evaluation report was yet to be public, as of Monday.

However, without sharing much details, the Ministry of Posts, Telecommunications and Information Technology on Monday said in a press release that Lack of proper feasibility and stakeholder consultation caused frequent changes in project scope and design.

"As a result the cost escalation and delay deprived people from getting timely benefits" of the state spending, it reads.

In many projects the financial, technological and broader economic impact were not properly assessed, and that caused projects' failure in collecting

Reflecting a lack of transparency, many finished projects were found to have unresolved audit objections over years while there had been no project completion report that made it tough for the committee to evaluate the effectiveness of the project.

For no repetition of such cases, the committee deep stakeholder consultation, proper feasibility studies at first for justification of the projects in future.

To resolve audit objections quickly, projects should start with better preparation, the committee said.

It also recommended regular inspection to ensure the quality of the state spending.

The government will further scrutinize the audit objections to dig deeper, two senior ministry officials told TBS.

"Projects accomplished, but gigantic audit objections left unresolved for years and the ministry will dig deeper," one said, seeking anonymity.

Audit objections related to the Bangladesh Telecommunication Company Limited (BTCL) and the Directorate of Posts outnumbered.

According to the committee, amid an absence of proper stakeholder consultation many projects lacked enough feasibility for massive state spending and their benefit was insufficient.

For instance, the officials named the Tk2,800 crore Bangabandhu Satellite project which is unlikely to earn a revenue of that amount in its 15 year lifetime, let alone profits.

Tk3,300 crore "Modernisation of Telecommunication Network (MoTN) for Digital Connectivity" of BTCL  also was in the list, the officials told TBS.

There might have been procurement irregularities in some projects that should be further scrutinized for actions, said the ministry officials while talking to TBS.

In the name of cutting bureaucratic complexities some projects were sent out of purview of the planning ministry's monitoring during the previous government that should not have happened.

For instance, he named the development spending from the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission's (BTRC) Social Obligation Fund.  

Around a dozen of the evaluated projects were running ones and the government will take a look into their updated status.

The ministry in August also formed a seven member committee to evaluate the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Division projects.

The committee evaluated the running projects at first and is trying to cut non-essential costs from 21 projects.

One of the committee members told TBS on Monday that they might end up saving over Tk4,500 crore of government funds soon as they approach the final report submission. 

The ICT Division projects during the Awami League government involved around Tk25,000 crore state spending that raised justification questions due to alleged lack of feasibility, overspending and non-transparent or manipulated procurement processes, according to ICT officials.