By Simeon Isako
The file of the Sino-Congolese contract continues to experience the rebound.
According to information received by CAS-INFO this Friday evening, two former directors of the Congolese Agency for Major Works (ACGT), were arrested by the Attorney General for overcharging for road works on Tourism and Lutendele Avenues and other Infrastructures ».
On March 11, the Attorney General at the Kinshasa Gombe Court of Appeal, Robert Kumbu, opened a legal file against the Congolese Agency for Major Works (ACGT) and the Chinese Contract Coordination Office for cases alleged overbilling of the infrastructure of the said contract.
This legal case opened against the two aforementioned structures was the logical continuation of the report published by the General Inspectorate of Finance (IGF) on the discrepancies that characterize this contract signed between the Congolese Government and a group of companies under Chinese law.
« The elements in my possession show cases of over-invoicing of infrastructure works carried out within the framework of the collaboration agreement of April 22, 2008 called “Chinese contract” between the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Group of Chinese companies (GEC) , the non-completion of works yet totally financed and non-execution of works already financed. The over-invoicing denounced comes from several artifices implemented during the conclusion of contracts for infrastructure works and their execution. These include in particular the exaggeration of unit costs and the rates of certain normal costs, the introduction into the cost of works of headings existing in contracts such as “sum to be worth “, informs the indictment of the Attorney General near the Court of Appeal of Kinshasa Gombe.
For the latter, all these facts suggest a misappropriation of public funds because the investments of the said works are funds loaned to the Democratic Republic of Congo which reimburses them with interest, on its ores sold to the joint venture SICOMINES.