The company that builds the Museum of Contemporary Art of Valdivia decided to paralyze the works and sue the State of Chile, accusing serious deficiencies from the MOP Architecture Directorate in the Los Rios Region.
the construction company B+V has been in charge of executing the restoration project of the Museum of Contemporary Art of Valdiviawhose client is the MOP Architecture Directorate, financed by the Regional Government, an initiative located in the Isla Teja sector in front of the Fluvial Fair.
However, there has been practically no progress on this work, which according to the Regional Government was slowed down by the increase in the cost of materials and which, according to the Directorate of Architecture, kept them in technical and legal analyzes to unlock the problem. .
After various attempts by Radio Bío Bío to obtain a response from the executing entity, the general manager of the B+V company, Francisco Villaseñor, confirmed that continuing with the project is unsustainable.
The senior executive stated that the contract began in June 2019 and had a term of 600 days, that is, 20 months. Currently, the work has been going on for three years, and they envision that the term should be extended by another 9 months. All this happened, according to what he said, because the projects delivered in the tender had serious uncertaintiescausing prolonged and systematic term increases.
For example, he indicated that they received three archaeological studies prior to the works that asked to protect five findings. However, after a short time, the company found many more, reaching a total of 19, which involves stopping work, informing the National Monuments Council and waiting for its response, releasing the intervened areas and then resuming work. An aspect sustained over time, according to Villaseñor.
In addition, he asserted that the air conditioning project for the MAC received by the principal had to be completely changed, because it was not buildable. Even at this point they still do not have the sanitary approval of the work, 35 months after the start of the work.
The general manager of the B+V company blamed the Architecture Department of the MOP Los Ríos.
“During the development of the work, we have had countless changes in the architecture project. We have had to completely change the general project, adding days and deadlines. Unfortunately, the architecture department of the MOP has systematically refused to pay the enormous amount of general expenses that we have had to cover as a construction company. The problems we had in the delivered projects were never recognized,” said Villaseñor.
The senior executive lamented this current scenario, since important works have been handed over to use in the Los Lagos Region, and others previously in the Los Rios Region. However, faced with what he described as serious inefficiencies, they decided to sue the State, demand compensation for damages and request the definitive stoppage of the work.
“After countless meetings, many times officially communicating with them, we made the decision to prosecute the project. For this reason, we filed a lawsuit against the State of Chile to request compensation for damages and the definitive stoppage of the work.”sentenced the executive.
Additional expenses to continue the work would be 1,500 million pesos, according to the general manager of the company. The construction works are stopped and there are only surveillance and cleaning tasks.
Regarding the situation of unpaid salaries, Radio Bío Bío was informed that within the next few weeks the salaries and contributions for March and April should be paid, with May and June remaining pending.
For now, from the Seremi of Public Works or the Regional Directorate of Architecture, they have remained silent after being consulted the distributions about the MAC works.