Early in November last year, a breach occurred in the East Demerara Water Conservancy (EDWC) dam causing severe flooding, damage and dislocation in the village of Cane Grove. An investigation of the breach was commissioned by President Bharrat Jagdeo and a report recently submitted to the government. It has been disclosed that the report will be discussed at tomorrow's Cabinet meeting. Given the pressing issues that have been raised in it, the government needs to take swift action to prevent another failure of the dam and to address the many grave shortcomings cited in the work that was being done on the dam just prior to the breach.

It is clear from the report that the expensive project to repair the dam was misconceived as it included raising the level of the dam - something which had been expressly warned against in the past and which was not included as an option in the 1998 report by a consultant which the Inter-American Development Bank used to arrive at its financing decision. This in itself raises very serious questions about the formulation of projects for international financing and is something that all those responsible have to begin explaining.

The design and preparation of the contract documents was shoddily done, the report said. In particular, it was envisaged that much of the design work would be done in the construction phase, something the investigating team said was highly unsatisfactory. The bills of quantities made provision for clearing the conservancy dam of all vegetation and stripping of the topsoil. The report labelled this provision as "incomprehensible" as the dam was over one hundred years old and well consolidated.

When the project got underway, the manner in which the work was done and supervised s

hould also have set off alarm bells. Apparently it didn't. The investigating team found that the contractor, BK international and the engineer, who also happened to be the Chairman of the National Drainage and Irrigation Board, did not comply with contract requirements in a number of areas.

The engineer did not properly delegate authority to various engineer's representatives who were assigned to the project, instructions from the engineer to the contractor were not passed down in writing, no superintendent of the works was assigned and there was no documentary evidence of any tests being done on material which was to be used for the dam works. In the case of the latter infraction, the investigating team was told by the engineer's assistant that approval of the material was "based on visual inspection".

There was also no documentary evidence that crucial pre-construction surveys were carried out and no evidence of a detailed work programme. Further, the engineer's assistant confirmed that work occurred outside normal working hours and this was unsupervised. The contractor in an interview with the team had denied this.

In addition, the technical specifications for the work related to a typical sea defence contract and were inappropriate for the dam work. In what could also be a critical finding, excavation was done by the contractor within 60 feet of the crest of the existing embankment in contravention of the stipulations. It was determined by the investigating team that none of the engineer's representatives or assistants had previous experience in earthen dam construction and as a result several vital aspects necessary for the integrity of the dam were not adhered to. There was no full time engineer assigned to the project and while regular inspections were made by the engineer in the early stages, visits were less frequent in the later stages and daily supervision was entrusted to the engineer's assistant who the report said did not have the requisite engineering capabilities.

In its assessment of the method of construction, the probe team zeroed in on what appears to be a key factor: excavation of material for use in the project. Excavation occurred within the borrow trench of the conservancy close to the dam, downstream of the conservancy - thereby creating a second borrow trench - and from the edges of the conservancy savannah. The probe team posited that the results of several of the construction methods would have contributed to making the dam unstable. The second borrow trench was inadvertently created closer to the dam during construction resulting in a narrow dam with steep slopes on both sides and reducing the seepage path. It added that these poor construction techniques are pivotal to failures by seepage. It was its conclusion that the dam failed because of piping caused by excessive seepage. The unsuitability of the materials used in the dam project was also a subject of comment by the investigators.

In their recommendations, the investigators said the breach should be sealed permanently and immediately, the entire vulnerable 8.3 mile section of the dam between Annandale and Cane Grove should be addressed and there should be a daily reporting system on the state of the dam.

The report paints a very unsatisfactory picture of the way the project was conceived, designed, implemented and supervised. There would be good reason to worry that this is standard fare in the expensive public works arena. The government must act now to convince the public that this isn't the case and perhaps experienced engineers could be asked to scrutinise the entire project thus far and to submit recommendations on what should be done to pre-empt a recurrence.

In the context of the failed project, it behoves the government to determine culpability for the various shortcomings cited and to apply appropriate sanctions against those responsible. It must also seek to recover the cost incurred as a result of the breach and the remainder of the work should then be re-tendered, addressing all of the mistakes made in the previous process.

In all of this, the government should take heed of the increasingly stringent accountability standards that are being set for aid money not only funnelled bilaterally but also through multilateral agencies.