Contractors working on the multifunctional sports stadium at Essipong near Sekondi, have expressed fears over the early completion of the stadium if the external works does not commence in earnest. According to the contractors, Shanghai Group of Companies (SCG), even though the major structure was near completion and still a month ahead of schedule, external works remained a major bother. The head of the contracting firm, Mr Zhu Yian said this when he interacted with the Executive Committee members of the Sports Writers Association (SWAG) who were at Essipong on a fact-finding tour of the site on Friday. The Chinese explained that external works were not part of the contract signed with the Ministry of Education, Science and Sports and therefore they could not do anything about the situation. He said there was the immediate need for the Ministry to facilitate the award of contract for the external works to commence. Mr Yian noted that the external works needed to commence early March to ensure its completion before December this year adding that, "anything short of this would definitely delay the project." The contractor said they had been informed of arrangements by the ministry to award the contract for work to commence but the process seemed to be quite slow. "Ours is just a reminder to the ministry that there might be a delay if preparations for the external works take another month, since time is going and the works must start now." He said his company would be ready to take up the contract if they were awarded but added that, it would depend on the time frame since the external works also required some amount of digging and leveling. Mr Yian noted that work on the stadium itself had seen much progress and they were ready to hand it over to the ministry by the close of October. According to the contractors they were laying the foundation for the football pitch and the tartan tracks, while the mechanical and electrical installations were also on course. He said grassing of the pitch would commence in March whilst the tartan tracks would be ready in June with the fixing of the chairs also scheduled for June. The 20,000 all-seater stadium, according to the contractors would have modern facilities such as a scoreboard, 40 rooms for accommodation, offices, conference and dressing rooms and a media centre among others. The stadium has 28 exit points including four major ones. Source GNA