April 6 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria's Road Infrastructure Agency (RIA) has announced the cancellation of the tender for construction of Zheleznitsa tunnel on Struma motorway, a project with an indicative value of 250 million levs ($136.2 million/128 million euro).
Seventeen candidates had placed bids in the tender procedure that closed in August 2016.
The government agency has identified several deficiencies requiring cancellation of the tender procedure, Pirin Penchev, the head of RIA, said in a statement posted on the agency's website.
The National Company Strategic Infrastructure Projects has misinformed the candidates that they could place offers higher than the indicative value of the project, Penchev noted.
Another reason for the cancellation of the tender was the missing technical offer of one of the participants in the tender.
The tender envisages the construction of a 2 km tunnel, which would be Bulgaria's longest road tunnel, as well as two bridges and adjacent roads with a total length of 2.5 km. The works should be completed in 1,400 days.
The project was planned to be implemented under the EU Operational Programme Transport and Transport Infrastructure 2014-2020.
The Struma motorway, with a total length of 173.28 km, is part of pan-European transport Corridor IV, linking Bulgaria's capital Sofia with the Greek border at Kulata checkpoint. Its construction is divided into four sections, of which three are completed: Dolna Dikanya – Dupnitsa, Dupnitsa – Blagoevgrad, and Sandanski-Kulata, while Blagoevgrad-Sandanski, which includes the Zheleznitsa tunnel, remains to be built.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)