HARARE – A Zimbabwe Power Company (ZPC) official has told the High Court the US$25 million being demanded by Wicknell Chivayo as damages for being elbowed out of the lucrative Gwanda Solar Power Project was overstated.
The Intratek Zimbabwe company owner has slapped the ZPC with the lawsuit following the termination of the deal.
Chivayo contends terminating the contract by ZPC caused him reputational damage across the world.
But testifying in court Wednesday, Cleophas Fambi, who is ZPC Projects Manager Renewable, said the amount was “overstated” considering how the businessman performed after winning the US$173 million 100 megawatts deal.
Being led by Daniel Tivadar, the lawyer representing the power utility, Fambi said “US$25 million claimed for pre-commencement work is overstated because major work was not done. A lot is still yet to be done.”
Earlier, Chivayo had told court that major work had been done and what was left would not take him two weeks to complete.
Contrary to claims by the businessman that the deal was in fact bungled by ZPC, Fambi said the government owned power firm had wanted the best to emerge from the contract.
“ZPC, from my understanding, had all intentions of carrying out this project and that’s why they entered into a contract with Intratrek Zimbabwe after a long time of consultations.
“ZPC put their money and they paid. Paying is an indicator that one is interested in a project.
“We wanted it done and finished. ZPC also paid at the addendum level. I don’t think anyone not interested would pay money,” he said.
Chivayo was paid US$5,6 million for the pre-commencement work.
ZPC said nothing meaningful was done on the site resulting in the collapse of the contract.
Chivayo insists that 90 percent of the work was done and went on to claim that he personally paid subcontractors after ZPC refused to do so.
The businessman said he cleared all the 200 hectares of land even when the funds required for the task had not been fully disbursed by the contractor.
He claims he was owed the money.
Court heard that part of the work that was supposed to be done included the septic tank soak away installation but nothing was done.
Intratrek Zimbabwe was also supposed to put in place water storage and ablution, radio facilities but this was not done.
Chivayo is adamant that some key work that consume huge amounts of money were completed.
“Important things that consume huge amounts were completed, water provision costs less than US$5 000, septic and soak away is also cheap and radio system installation only costs about US$600.
“These are minor things and will not take me more than a fortnight to complete,” he said.
Chivayo said ground site clearing was expensive, costing him US$2 million dollars.
He was asked how much he paid subcontractors but he refused to disclose the figure.
“I will not explain how much we paid our sub-contractor in front of my contractor.
“It was less than US$1,7 million because I had to make money out of it,” he said.
ZPC said Chivayo was merely suing the company to enrich himself and did not consider that he was given US$5,6 million advance payment.
Fambi said clearing of the land was not too expensive.
He also said at the time of inspection, the “project was partially complete or would say incomplete.”
“Vegetation clearing was done 100 percent, civil work 0 percent. From my point of view, the majority of work is what remains.
“Civil work not yet done, this required more effort than vegetation clearing,” he said.
Chivayo’s lawyer Advocate Lewis Uriri told court that the contractor should consider that the state wanted the project completed.
The businessman will submit his written closing submissions on September 23 and ZPC will file on the 26th.
The judge reserved the judgement indefinitely.
