Housing applications continue to drop

KUWAIT: Chairman of the Union of Consumer Co-operative Societies (UCCS) Saad Al-Shabo said he received a letter from the competition protection authority declaring that he is under investigation over earlier statements about unifying the prices of goods at various co-ops. The competition protection agency's chairman Nayef Allafi asked Shabo for detailed information about the decision to unify prices, because this would prevent competition and represents a clear violation of article 4 of the competition law which bans unifying or freezing prices, so that merchants could compete in satisfying consumers' needs and provide high quality products.

Partnership Projects

Chairman of the parliamentary budgets and final statements committee Adnan Abdulsamad said that the committee discussed the budget of the Kuwait Authority for Partnership Projects (KAPP) for the fiscal year 2017-2018 and its final statement for the fiscal year 2015-2016. Abdulsamad said the State Audit Bureau noticed that some of the contracts signed by the Touristic Enterprises Company (TEC) had been wrongly done without referring to KAPP's supreme committee. Audit Bureau reports also showed that the lease value of three contracts - Jahra and Ahmadi slaughterhouses and Mubarakiya Market had been increased from KD 137,000 to around KD 6 million. Meanwhile, the report found that Al-Zour North power plant's lease contract value was only KD 138,000, while the state pays around KD 26 million for the power it purchases from the investment company.

Housing applications

The Public Authority for Housing Welfare (PAHW) announced that total pending housing applications till the end of the previous fiscal year dropped to 98,516, compared to 103,000 in the first quarter of the same year, which was due to the increased pace of distributing housing units - 11,338 during the year. In this regard, the housing authority's report said the authority had signed contracts to develop the South Mutlaa City project and build and maintain road infrastructure for 18,000 units. The report also showed that the authority signed a contract to expand Wafra, including the construction of roads, parking spaces, infrastructure grids and 183 power stations.

By A Saleh