Only this week, news arrived that the construction of the Nis-Merdare highway would begin in the spring, and that the Moravian Corridor is expected to be completed in three years. We have calculated how much we will pay for those two highways per kilometer, but what is worrying is the already entrenched system of non-transparent borrowing for infrastructure projects through direct agreements with foreign countries – which has already cost some countries in the region dearly.
When it comes to the “freshest” projects, we calculated that the price of a kilometer of the Nis – Merdare highway will cost us 7.73 million euros, while the price of the Moravian Corridor, at least when it comes to the section Pojate – Preljina, is 6.77 million euros per kilometer.
Compared to the planned costs on other projects, it seems as if we hit the mentioned works “in action” – since, for example, a kilometer of the Belgrade – Sarajevo highway will cost us twice, while the section of “Milos Veliki” from Pozega to Boljar could reach two and a half times higher price than on the stretch from Pojat to Preljina.
It should also be noted that a tender is being prepared for only one large project – works on the Nis-Merdare highway. All other projects are the result of direct agreements with China, Turkey and Azerbaijan and companies from those countries – and Nova.rs has already written about the “results” of borrowing from China, when our former secretary in the Ministry of Finance and advisor to Zoran Djindjic’s government Dusan Nikezic said that in the next 20 years we will allocate about 500 million euros a year to repay those loans.
Here’s how we calculated the price of a highway per kilometer: we took publicly available data from the Ministry of Construction, Transport and Infrastructure on ongoing or estimated investment projects – and divided it by the length of the highway sections for which the investment was planned.
Such a method showed that currently the most favorable is the construction of a highway and a fast road on the stretch Ruma – Sabac – Loznica, but the price of 5.84 million euros per kilometer does not say much, since the two types of roads are “mixed” in one project. The contractor for this move is the Azerbaijani “Azvirt”.
Next on our list is the section of the Moravian corridor Pojate – Preljina, with 6.77 million euros per kilometer, where the works are performed by a consortium of the American company “Bechtel” and the Turkish company “Enka”.
It is interesting that this consortium participated in one of the rare tenders for the selection of contractors, and was the only one to submit a bid last August, but somehow the surprise is less when you consider that in 2018 the state signed a Memorandum of Understanding and cooperation on the construction of this section so one could get the impression that the winner was chosen even before the invitation to potential contractors to submit bids.
In third place is the project of the first phase of works on the highway Nis – Plocnik – Merdare, which should start in March next year. It is not yet known who will build this section, considering that the tender should be announced in October, but it is known that the works are already late – they should have started in 2018 so that this section could be completed this year.
The construction of a half-profile highway on the section Merosina – Beloljin, 33 kilometers long, will cost us 7.73 million euros per kilometer, which is almost twice the price we will pay for a kilometer of the highway Belgrade – Sarajevo, on the section Sremska Raca – Kuzmin, where the contractor, Turkish “Tasyapi” we pay 13.89 million euros per kilometer.
Let us remind you that Serbia is also relying heavily on Chinese infrastructure loans: the total value of “joint projects” between Serbia and China, as they were called by the Minister of Infrastructure Zorana Mihajlovic, is worth more than 7 billion euros – and what they have in common is that China finances those projects, while Serbia pays for them. Experts therefore warn that Serbia, like Montenegro, is plunging into debt slavery because of such arrangements with China, Nova reports.
