ŠARANČIĆ: Construction of "Prokop" will be offered to second-ranked company

General Manager of "Serbian Railways", Milanko Šarančić, announced that that company would start negotiations with the second-ranked company on the tender for construction of railway station in Prokop, if the first-ranked "Trigranit" did not commence realization of obligations from the contract soon.

He reminded that the general contract on financing and development of commercial-business space and main passenger railway station "Beograd Centar" in Prokop had been signed with Cyprus-based company "Trigranit" more than one year before, but the works had not commenced.

- We will wait for few more days, for very short time, for the final decision of "Trigranit" - said Šarančić and pointed out that the management of Serbian railways, in coordination with authorized ministry, "very seriously" considered to commence negotiations with "Energoprojekt" as the second-ranked bidder.

According to his words, contract with "Energoprojekt" could be signed by the end of this year, while the works on "Prokop" could start the following year.

- If "Energoprojekt" shows readiness and has valid banks to back him up in realization of this large project, the chances are that we will go through the necessary procedure with "Energoprojektom" by the end of this year and that the works on Prokop will start in next spring - said Šarančić.

Explaining reasons why "Trigranit" did not start building "Prokop" after signing main and accompanying contracts, Šarančić said that that company had had additional requests that could have not been met.

- One of the later requests of "Trigranit", which is completely out of the scope of the tender, is that the minimum of 44,000 passengers uses railway station "Prokop" on daily basis - said Šarančić and added that the Railways could not and does not have to guarantee that.