President Asif Ali Zardari directed the authorities to complete the up-gradation project of Karachi-Hyderabad Super Highway (M-9) into a motorway in fifteen months from the date of commencement of work on the project. The commencement of construction would start by early next year.
President Zardari, while presiding a review meeting on the up-gradation of Karachi-Hyderabad Super Highway (M-9), also directed Finance Minister Dr Hafeez Sheikh and Sindh Finance Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah to hold a meeting with the bidders and provincial authorities to finalise the modalities.
He said that in order to complete the project expeditiously, the option and possibility of Public Private Partnership (PPP) and BOO (Build Operate and Own) is also seen. The President also said that the project could also be divided into sections and subcontracted by the main contractor so to expedite the work on the project. During the meeting, it was told that requests for the proposal have been submitted by two bidders, one from Malaysia and the other from Pakistan, which were being scrutinised from Financial and Evaluation perspectives. It was informed that after issuance of the Letter of Intent and Support, the project would enter into the stage of formal negotiations and signing of concession agreement with the qualifying firm by the end of this year. The meeting also reviewed the progress made so far on the up-gradation of M-9 project which was currently serving a traffic volume of over 21000 vehicles per day with over 60 per cent of heavy traffic.