The police investigation into suspected fraud in the certification of the Manwel Dimech Bridge has still not been concluded, 18 months after the probe was ordered, The Sunday Times has learnt.
Transport Minister Austin Gatt had ordered the investigation after learning that fraud could have taken place in the certification of work on the bridge soon after it was completed.
The suspicion arose when architect Robert Sant, whose consortium had been tasked with supervising the certification of the works on the bridge, realised that incorrect information and technical data works had been submitted by the contractors' foreign engineer with regard to the bridge's post-tension operations.
Mr Sant had flagged an e-mail sent by the Portuguese engineer responsible for certifying the bridge to his boss, the leading Italian contractor in the consortium entrusted with the civil works.
The e-mail states, in Italian: "The project manager is requesting the tensioning of cables 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.1 and 6.1 to 105 per cent. As agreed on the phone, I will pretend that I tensioned the cables during the Easter period (the supervisor is not at the site on these days) and will change the values a bit."
Despite the suspected abuse, the authorities insisted the bridge was safe although maintenance costs may rise.
The Manwel Dimech Bridge project was fraught with controversy because of delays. The €6 million job started in September 2006 and was originally expected to be completed within a year but the work took much longer than expected.
The main thoroughfare was reopened to traffic in April 2008, €2.3 million over budget.
In May last year, the Malta Transport Authority wrote to the Italian contractors entrusted with the bridge reconstruc-tion project, informing them that they had been fined over €620,700 for completing the job almost nine months behind schedule.
No other announcement had been made on the fine, or on whether this had been paid.
But in January, in a reply to a parliamentary question, Dr Gatt said talks were being held between the ADT and the contractor responsible on penalties for late completion of the project.
He said he could not table the project implementation report before talks aimed at averting legal action were held with the contractors.
mxuereb@timesofmalta.com