Plagued by allegations of corruption and mismanagement throughout its history, the new $3.7 billion Suvarnahumbi airport of Thailand's is still unfinished and now has the Thai Kingdom's flamboyant PM Thaksin Shinawatra cracking the whip to get the Suvarnahumbi airport project completed.
The long-delayed second international airport in Bangkok, which the Thai government last week conceded might not be finished in time for its planned September 2005 opening, has been bogged down since the year 1960 by political wrangling, corruption allegations and problems with the marshy site where the gigantic new airport is being build.
Bangkok's new Suvarnahumbi airport, situated about 25 kilometers (15.5 miles) east of Bangkok at Nong Ngu Hao, which means Cobra Swamp, is touted as being Southeast Asia's largest airport and the Thai government is banking on it to make Thailand the undisputed aviation hub of Asia.
Once completed, the first phase of Suvarnabhumi is expected to handle three million tonnes of cargo and accommodate up to 45 million passengers by year, which is 15 million more than Bangkok's Don Muang international airport can currently handle.
It will also be the only airport in the country capable of handling the latest 555-seater A380 Airbus, and could potentially accommodate more than 100 million passengers by year once the planned fourth runway will be completed.
But Bangkok's new airport, often cited as a prime example of poor economic planning and management of large infrastructure projects in the kingdom of Thailand, has already passed through two initial deadlines, the first in 1990 and the second in 2000. Construction only began in January 2002 and that year the International Air Transport Association ominously warned that while it calculated all new airports are 90% construction and 10% politics, here in Thailand, the Suvarnahumbi airport is 99% and only 1% construction.
Since then allegations of mismanagement have only intensified, and Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has now threatened state bans on the contractors if the new Bangkok airport is not finished in time for its planed September 2005 opening.
I told them that any contractor who delayed their job by more than 8% would not be allowed other Thai government contracts in the future, Thaksin warned Saturday during his weekly national radio address.
The more we delay the more we loose our chance of becoming Asia's aviation hub, said Thaksin, adding he believed the project was currently again between 7% to 8% behind schedule.
Italian-Thai Development Pcl, together with its partners Japan's Takenaka Corp. and Obayashi Corp. form the ITO joint-venture constructing Suvarnahumbi airport, which is financed mostly by the Japan Bank for International Cooperation and Airports of Thailand.
Investors signaled their lack of faith in the current deadline the day after an initial warning by Thaksin Thursday that Italian-Thai was on a government "grey list", which saw the company's stock fall to its lowest level since October 2003.
Italian-Thai finance vice-president Chatichai Chutima said during a tour of the Suvarnahumbi airport construction site that it where design delays, such as the delivery of undersize materials, which are causing most of the delays.
The new Bangkok airport is an enormous project and we have had some fairly significant obstacles relating to design, especially with selecting the right materials, said Chatichai pointing to the curved steel and glass ceiling in one of the long oval-shaped concourses.
At one point we had to replace the thousands of steel bracing rods, because we found out they were below the quality and size that we needed, he said. Last year sub-contractors and suppliers privately complained they were holding out on work and the delivery of construction materials because they were not getting paid, and this was the prime cause of the delay.
