A news item on the development of cracks in a flyover’s ramp has shocked the residents of Chattogram. Actually, the crack — on a ramp leading from Bahaddarhat to Kalurghat Road — was found in the MA Mannan Flyover late Monday night. Finding no other way, police stopped the movement of traffic on and under the flyover. But the general people started facing serious inconveniences to go to and from workplaces following tremendous traffic jams on other roads on Tuesday morning. Later, the traffic jam spread throughout the metropolis and made it hard for the residents to continue their normal activities smoothly. We’re very much disturbed seeing the irresponsibility and lack of accountability of authorities concerned in dealing with important projects.
The Chattogram Development Authority, or CDA, built the one-kilometer flyover spending over Tk 105 crore, which was inaugurated on October 12, 2013. Earlier, 17 people were killed and many others injured after a girder of the under-construction flyover collapsed in November 2012. After the fatal incident, the authorities hurriedly finished its construction without re-examining its plan and design. Moreover, no stringent measure was taken against the persons responsible for the deadly accident. So far as we knew, initially the contract for building the flyover was awarded to a ruling party leader’s firm. There are many more such stories. On March 14 this year, six people including three Chinese workers were injured after a girder in the construction site for the Bus Rapid Transit project collapsed in front of Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka. On March 13, 2017, a heavy girder fell from Malibagh-Mouchak flyover leaving a worker dead and two others injured.
In fact, construction of flyovers, roads and bridges is a lucrative business. First of all it involves a big amount of money. Secondly, the projects are controlled by the syndicate highly linked with ruling party men. And thirdly, there is no need for accountability. So, the contractors don’t show any interest to complete their projects in time as they know time extension will fatten their budget. Each and every development project has enjoyed time extension with expansion of budget. We witnessed the construction of Malibagh-Mouchak flyover with wrong design and plan taking several years of extra time. This flyover was built following Western design of left-hand driving roads. But our traffic follows the right-hand driving roads. When making money becomes the desperate desire, defective projects are always welcome. We see no change in the system.
