A year and 9 months ago, OPINIÓN CARIBE interviewed two social leaders from the village of Bonda, Saúl Martínez and Magali Bautista, who at that time demanded seriousness and compliance from the Mayor’s Office of Santa Marta in the timely delivery of the Child Development Center project , CDI which started in 2015 and today is still one more white elephant in the capital of Magdalena.
During the mayoralty of Rafael Martínez, and after the 1st year of Virna Johnson’s mandate, the CDI of Bonda remains the same, only a skeleton appears that over time seems more a work of non-figurative abstract art, which should be awarded the Future award Generation Art.
An unfinished work that was signed in 2014 and began construction in 2015 with a cost of more than 2 billion pesos and that, at present, is abandoned and deteriorated, despite the fact that the previous mayor Rafael Martínez promised to deliver it in December 2019, which he did not comply with.
Since December 13, 2018, a block has not been moved on the site and there is still no exact delivery date. Meanwhile, rust takes over the metal structures, the panels are falling apart, and the site is a den for drug addiction and weeds.
Saúl Martínez mentioned that, “The community has been looted, everyone’s emotions were played with because we thought that with this work we would be able to unify all children’s homes and give education more formality. The community is demotivated ”.
The land on which the work was carried out is land without legalization, in which a park was operated where the children had fun. The deal made by the bonderos was that they accepted the construction of the CDI as long as they complied with this structure, since the benefits offered were greater. “This project at the moment leaves a negative impact because being a practically abandoned lot full of weeds, it generates insecurity,” said Bautista.
During December 2019, the Office of the Comptroller General of the Republic evidenced weakness in the supervision functions by the Mayor’s Office of Santa Marta in the works of execution of the Child Development Center and the Playroom of the village of Bonda, due to the lack of rigor and efficiency of control and surveillance of district resources.
The contract that was signed six years and a few months ago, its budget was delivered by almost 90 percent to be completed in six months and after the contractors left the work during the month of December 2018, it was reason for the General Comptroller’s Office de la República, CGR, made a visit on September 20, 2019 to verify that the structure showed deterioration, damage and limitation in its use.
The Comptroller’s Office evidenced the configuration of damage to the public patrimony in an amount, only with Bonda, for $ 1,948,488,858, for the “loss of the total amount of public resources invested in unfinished works.” However, the District argues that, because the contract had not been received or settled, it was premature to assert the existence of patrimonial damage to the public purse.
The control body insists on this damage, since it reflected the problems of lack of planning and execution, which derive that to date there is no certainty of the real completion of the same.
So far, the control body has not commented on this great white elephant that has affected the public resources of the city and the community.
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