Top Chinese contractor steps up pace of work on massive projects in Malaysia and Sri Lanka

China Communications Construction Company, China’s largest engineering firm, is firmly on track with its railway project in Malaysia and is stepping up construction of a Sri Lankan port city development that had been suspended for a year.

CCCC president Chen Fenjian told the South China Morning Post in a written response to questions that the US$12.8 billion railway project – the largest ongoing overseas undertaking by a Chinese company – which will connect Malaysia’s east and west coasts, commenced construction in August and was being “actively advanced”. He, however, did not disclose details including the expected completion date.

The $1.4 billion Colombo Port City in Sri Lanka, Chen said, was being built “in an accelerated pace”, after it had been put on hold by the country’s new government between 2015-16. Another CCCC official had told the Post earlier that it would be completed by 2030.

Both projects are located in key nodes of China’s Belt and Road Initiative.

CCCC has secured US$20 billion worth of overseas infrastructure contracts in the first half of 2017, of which $15.3 billion are from Belt and Road regions, according to its financial report for the first half of 2017.

But the projects have not been without controversy. The Colombo Port City, which will reclaim some 2.7 square kilometres of land, on which will sit flats, offices, shopping centres, hotels and exhibition centres, was suspended for about a year after the new administration took office and put on hold for re-examination most accords that had been signed by the previous administration. CCCC had complained of hefty losses because of the work stoppage.