Education Minister Musa Mohamed has failed to 'tell all' as promised regarding the controversy surrounding computer labs in school, said DAP secretary-general Kerk Kim Hock today.

While he welcomed the government's move to terminate the contract awarded to the company said to be responsible for the problem, the opposition leader said the minister left certain important questions unanswered.

"Musa has clearly not addressed many questions which he must deal with if he wants to keep his promise to tell all," he said in a statement.

Yesterday, Musa announced the decision to terminate the services of the contractor Bell Grand Sdn Bhd, and the project management consultant QSC Projects Sdn Bhd.

The minister had said earlier that he would also explain why no action was taken after the contractor missed the May 14, 2001 deadline to complete the labs.

The controversy erupted when Deputy Education Minister Aziz Shamsuddin revealed that only about 40 percent of computer labs commissioned for national schools were fully operational.

Following this, Works Minister S Samy Vellu said out of the 600 labs built in the eastern zone (Kelantan, Pahang and Terengganu), 574 were found to have failed to meet with building specifications or were in dangerous conditions.

The issues

Among the issues that require clarification, Kerk said the government should first justify why it privatised the project when such projects should fall under the purview of the Public Works Department.

He said the government should also clarify why the project was awarded to one contractor per sector (northern, eastern, central and southern zones) and appointed a project management consultant without verifying whether it had the resources to carry out the tasks.

"Has the Public Works Department completed its investigations into labs built in other zones? Why is the problem particularly serious in the eastern zone?"

Kerk also reiterated the demand for a probe into the validity of the documents he submitted to the Prime Minister's Department relating to the project management consultant.

The documents contain allegations against a top treasury official and questioned the appointment of several management consultants to handle projects beyond their capacity.

"Although the documents I received were undated and unsigned, the in-depth information which specified the project and name of companies showed it was reliable," he said.

Wrong analogy

According to Kerk, other allegations included deferred payment schemes, appointment of unregistered contractors and awarding of contracts through direct negotiations.

The contractors were alleged to be not registered, neither with the Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB) nor the Contractors Service Centre (CSC).

"They should not have been awarded contracts to build school labs..." he said.

He added that the power to grant any exemption for non-registration with CID and CSC was with the Works minister and Entrepreneur Development Minister not with anybody in the Finance Ministry.

On the education minister's analogy that the government, as a house owner, should not be faulted, Kerk said the analogy would only be correct if the project was a private investment.

"The government is not a real 'house owner' but merely contractors elected by the people to manage the nation for five years. The government must therefore justify and account for all its decisions," he stressed.