Vocal critic of new Parliament complex construction denies seeking to undermine Sino-Thai's business

Watchara on Thursday held a press conference to respond to an allegation by Pakpoom Srichamni, the president of Sino-Thai Engineering & Construction Plc.

On Monday, Pakpoom held a press conference with some Sino-Thai executives that a group of politicians had been attacking the company via the media ceaselessly and caused damage to the company.

Pakpoom insisted that Sino-Thai has been building the Parliament Complex in line with the contract and since it was a mega-project, it was impossible for the company to hand over the completed jobs in one go.

Pakpoom said Sino-Thai had to gradually hand over the completed jobs, and defects could occur later after usage of some parts of the project.

Without mentioning Watchara’s name directly, Pakpoom said it was not fair to the company for someone to try to block the job handling-over process.

Watchara said he did not seek to block the completion of the project and he would not have had to come out to expose alleged wrongdoings had the company strictly complied with the contract and the construction blueprint.

Watchara noted that Sino-Thai tried to hand over the complete project to the inspection committee headed by Sathit Prasertsak, deputy secretary-general of the House Secretariat, on July 4 but the committee voted to reject the work, deeming them incomplete.

Watchara alleged that Sino-Thai had failed to follow the contract and blueprint for several items. For example, he alleged, the walls of meeting rooms of parliamentary panels did not meet the blueprint specifications, and the company had failed to follow the blueprint regarding underground power cables and it allegedly failed to install soundproof doors for the meeting rooms of the parliamentary panels.

Watchara said Sino-Thai had signed a contract to build the Parliament complex for 12.28 billion baht in 900 days. The company has withdrawn all the money but the project has not been completed even after 3,400 days.

Watchara has repeatedly criticised leaks from the ceiling and said that rainwater had got into the building during heavy rains.

For example, he said on October 2 rainwater had leaked from the rooftop of the new parliamentary building down the fire exits to enter all rooms on the fifth floor.

He said rainwater used to leak into the library on the ninth floor and had caused the library ceiling to collapse.

On October 11, Watchara alleged that Sino-Thai had failed to meet the requirements regarding trees that it had to relocate to be planted inside the complex, causing at least 54 trees to die.