T

he consortium constructing the monorail megaproject, PT Jakarta Monorail (JM), has reiterated its commitment to procuring pillars already built by the state-owned construction company PT Adhi Karya and paying for them by the end of this year.

'€œThis morning, we talked to [president director of Adhi Karya] Pak Kiswo [Darmawan] about the procurement. We hope to settle it by the end of this year at the latest,'€ Edward Soeryadjaya, the chairman of Ortus Holdings Ltd., JM'€™s majority shareholder, said on Tuesday.

Built by state-owned construction company PT Adhi Karya in 2004, the prospective monorail pillars along roads in Senayan, Central Jakarta, and in Kuningan, South Jakarta, have become eyesores in the capital city since construction was suspended in 2008.

The project, which had been approved by the central government, was suspended because JM failed to secure an indemnity guarantee from then governor Fauzi Bowo.

Adhi Karya'€™s Kiswo was unavailable for an interview when contacted on Tuesday. He had previously said that there was no agreement on the cost of the supporting pillars.

Meanwhile, Adhi Karya corporate secretary Amrozi Hamidi said there was no new deal between the companies. '€œWe agreed to the payment of Rp 190 billion [US$16.7 million] by JM, according to the instructions of Governor Jokowi during a meeting with Adhi Karya management representatives. The payment must be complete before [JM] can use the pillars,'€ he said in a text message.

JM president director Sukmawati Syukur said the procurement of the pillars would be a purely a business-to-business agreement, which was subject to a review or due diligence covering financial, technical and legal evaluations.

'€œThis is not about the money because Rp 190 billion is a small amount compared to this Rp 8.1 trillion-megaproject. But, the process should be clear. The due diligence process is necessary because we have to be responsible to our investors,'€ she said.

She said the company needed to have the technical details of the pillars because the train supplied by the Chinese contractor, China Communications Construction Corporation Ltd. (CCCC), had different specifications from the previously planned trains from Indonesia '€” and Germany-based company Siemens.

Sukmawati said the current train was bigger and had a heavier payload, so it might be necessary to modify or strengthen the existing pillars.

The evaluation and procurement process, she said, took a long time because the consortium needed to complete required documents to get the approval letter to continue the project from Governor Joko '€œJokowi'€ Widodo, the letter was eventually issued on Oct. 9.

A member of Ortus Holdings'€™ board of directors John Aryananda said there were two calculations of the cost of the support pillars and related expenditure. The first was from Adhi Karya'€™s consultant, which said the support pillars were worth Rp 193 billion, while the second evaluation was from the Finance and Development Comptroller (BPKP), which stated the support pillars were worth Rp 130 billion.

'€œAs an investor, we believe there should be an independent evaluation, but if Adhi Karya refuses to go along, we will use the BPKP'€™s evaluation,'€ he said.