Download - Trust for African Rock Art

42Construction Site Meetings - G. Nyasuna-WangaConstruction was one of the mostchallenging aspects of this project. Almostevery two months we held constructionmeetings on site and these almost alwaysleft us, as clients, with a bad headache. Ourcontractor, like most in the business, had away of touching raw nerves by proposingthat his payments be increased due to theskyrocketing prices of materials or slightchanges in the designs, or variancesbetween the prices quoted in the Bills ofQuantities and what he had actually spent.We were always up in arms trying to arguethat this was a fixed contract and underno circumstances could the contractorclaim additional payment (we knew too well that the donor would give us no additionalfunding and there was no giving in to any such demands). This was the character of mostconstruction meetings.At one of these meetings we began to get the feeling that the contractor was completelyoverwhelmed and unable to complete the building within both the budget and the deadline.Despite threats of legal action and pursuing him with police, he just smiled (as he hadannoyingly grown so accustomed to doing in such heated times) and said in his heavy Luoaccent “Madam Gladys, I cannot finis (the ’h’ was silent) these houses with that money, thatmoney is too small, bringing materials to this hill (read island) is very expensive.”At this point it dawned on us that we would need to take drastic measures to ensure that thebuilding would be completed in good time and within reasonable limits of the budget. Webrought in an external consultant, Douglas D’Costa, to act as Clerk of Works, which wasneeded but not assigned by the architects from the start; with concerted efforts from theClerk of Works, the community and Jack, the buildings were reasonably complete beforethe official opening. Construction of the buildings was one aspect that overshot its originalbudget substantially, but when they were eventually completed – we breathed a sigh ofrelief.