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Construction progress on the Capital Centre Rotana in Abu Dhabi has largely stopped following wrangling over payment and the delay to the appointment of a fit-out contractor, Group 3 Engineers Contractors has said.
The main contractor on the $112m (AED410m) office and hotel twin structure, visited by CW last September, said it has completed the vast majority of the structure and is working on some smaller final tasks.
But a source at the contractor revealed that a contractor to do the interiors and fit-out has not been selected by the client, Al Badie Trading & Investments, meaning there is essentially no company to hand the structure to. At the same time the client has stalled in its payment to Group 3, leaving the contractor sitting on site.
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“The project was supposed to be finished on 19th June, including everything, but now we have extended that,” said a source. “We have worked on the main structure, the parking, the basement. This is all finished, but we can’t hand over until the client finalises the payment then we can complete all work.”
The source added that the selection of an interiors company has been delayed based on the increasing demands on the hopeful tendering firms to reduce costs, a situation the source could sympathise with.
“If you are doing a project and it is at a loss to you, why do it?”
Samer Shawa, finance director for Al Badie Group’s project development division, and Dr Yaseen Alkamas, project development director, were unavailable for comment upon CW enquiry throughout Monday.
The building is one of three from Rotana in the Capital Centre, a large urban development adjacent to the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre in the centre of the capital.
The 24-storey building will comprise a 324-room hotel, of 18 rooms per floor, designed to the specifications of a Singapore-based designer, Miaja Design Group, on behalf of Rotana hotels. The office part of the building starts from the third floor to the twenty-fourth.
Construction had been swift at the site last year despite the technical difficulty of building two towers simultaneously that have different ceiling heights, and the delayed excavation and implementation of utility pipes from ADWEA.
The delay to the award for the fit-out has now reached a year this month. At the end of July 2010, CW, was told: “The tender was supposed to close on 26th July but has been put back by three weeks because a lot of contractors have been on vacation. “Plus, it takes a while to be able to plan the delivery of all the specialist materials.”
Group 3 Engineers Contractors is currently tendering for projects in the capital.
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