Friday
26th Apr 2024
Dhivehi Edition
Managing Director of Fenaka, Ahmed Saeed.
Fenaka has been accused of withholding millions of Rufiyaa in payments owed to contractors for various projects throughout the country.
A statement released by the Contractors' Association had read that contracting companies had not received any payment on work done. Some of the work had been done for state-owned companies. The Maldives Journal had contacted several contractors to verify these claims.
On the condition of anonymity, one contractor said that since construction had slowed down, they were relying on government-funded projects. Fenaka Corporation had announced most of these projects, the contractor had alleged.
The owner of a company who had won a bid for a Fenaka project and had successfully completed it in one of the outer islands had said that they had been unable to pay their employees' salaries for the past two months. They were personally unable to pay the rent anymore. They said that, in addition, their inability to pay companies that had supplied them equipment and material had ruined their reputation.
This is such a sad state of affairs! They're holding onto only MVR 2.5 million. I can't pay my workers, and I'm unable to carry out many other things in my life because of this. I'm tired of begging.Contractor Who Had Worked on Fenaka Project
Another contractor who spoke with The Maldives Journal on the condition of anonymity had shown the individual invoices that they had sent to Fenaka.These invoices sum up to almost MVR 13 million. They said that their company has not received a single Rufiyaa from Fenaka as of yet.
They confessed that they had complained of this situation to some parliamentarians. However, they responded that if they were to do anything about it: they would not be able to do anything for their own constituencies. "You need to handle your affairs yourself", one MP had said to them.
They said that there were about 60 companies that had not received any payments. These were all companies that had worked on projects throughout the country. They mentioned some of the names of the companies as well as the islands where the projects were located. Some of these projects had been worth MVR 1 - 2 million, while others had been worth MVR 10 - 12 million.
They noticed that while local contracting companies had not been paid, Fenaka had not failed to regularly pay Mohan Mutha, an Indian company. They also mentioned that even though Fenaka claims that they had earned MVR 35 million profit at the end of 2020, they likely owed contractors more than this.
When asked why they had not lodged this complaint to any investigative body, they answered that since the only way to get work these days was through Fenaka: lodging a complaint would make it harder to win bids.
Although some of the contractors contacted by The Maldives Journal had refused to give more details, they did not deny the fact that Fenaka had not paid them for work done.
They confessed that they had complained of this situation to some parliamentarians. However, they responded that if they were to do anything about it: they would not be able to do anything for their own constituencies. "You need to handle your affairs yourself", one MP had said to them.
They said that there were about 60 companies that had not received any payments. These were all companies that had worked on projects throughout the country. They mentioned some of the names of the companies as well as the islands where the projects were located. Some of these projects had been worth MVR 1 - 2 million, while others had been worth MVR 10 - 12 million.
They noticed that while local contracting companies had not been paid, Fenaka had not failed to regularly pay Mohan Mutha, an Indian company. They also mentioned that even though Fenaka claims that they had earned MVR 35 million profit at the end of 2020, they likely owed contractors more than this.
When asked why they had not lodged this complaint to any investigative body, they answered that since the only way to get work these days was through Fenaka: lodging a complaint would make it harder to win bids.
Although some of the contractors contacted by The Maldives Journal had refused to give more details, they did not deny the fact that Fenaka had not paid them for work done.