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It was meant to be the announcement of a positive outcome to a long drawn out saga that has drained public coffers for the last four years, but when on 6 November, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi triumphantly announced the conclusion of negotiations with Swedish consortium Skanska over the construction of Mater Dei, the final packet turned out to be a very expensive solution indeed.
On 14 November MaltaToday carried an extensive analysis of the numbers and documents presented in Parliament by Gonzi and compared the results of the ‘new’ negotiations with the original contract signed with Skanska in 2000. The analysis revealed that despite Gonzi’s summer-long brave-face showing that he was steadfast in his demands, the end result was nothing more than a reflection of how Government caved in to the Swedish construction company.
As a result of the ‘new’ agreement Malta will end up paying Lm45 million more for the construction of Mater Dei than what was projected in 2000. The construction cost for Mater Dei is now set at Lm139 million as opposed to the Lm93 million initially agreed to in 2000. Furthermore, the completion date has been extended from June 2005 to 1 July 2007. It also means that penalties to the tune of Lm5 million accrued by Skanska because of missed deadlines since 2000 have been forgiven.
Government’s claim to victory remains the fact that it managed to negotiate a final price way below what Skanska had been asking for before the start of negotiations. What the Prime Minister failed to say is that Government completely discarded the 2000 contract during the negotiations and adopted the benchmarks set by Skanska, which had every interest to up its costs and demands.
The very same Gap Analysis Report Gonzi presented in Parliament showed that since September 2003 Skanska was already projecting a new final cost of around Lm139 million. Somehow, mysteriously, just before starting negotiations soon after Gonzi was appointed Prime Minister, the consortium threw in a further Lm23 million saying they were claims made by contractors.
Skanska’s move may have very well been a ploy to get what they really wanted, Lm139 million, leading the Prime Minister to believe he had championed a good agreement.
But the Mater Dei saga also had other twists to it. It all started in controversy when it became public knowledge that two of the people appointed to the Mater Dei negotiating team were the Prime Minister’s cousins.
Another issue was the polite sidelining of Health Minister Louis Deguara who until the beginning of the year had always been the reference point for the Mater Dei project. Gonzi took the issue into his hands, promised to resolve it once and for all, and thrust Parliamentary Secretary Tonio Fenech in the limelight. Negotiations were headed by the upcoming Fenech rather than Deguara.
The cherry on the cake however must certainly be the new opening deadline for the hospital on 1 July 2007. It happily coincides with Lawrence Gonzi’s fifty-fourth birthday.
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