Construction Jihad

After 34 days of Israeli bombing, says the Lebanese Higher Relief Council, 15,000 homes, 78 bridges, 900 businesses, 630 roads, 25 fuel stations and 31 utility plants were destroyed. Rebuild costs are set to exceed the $10bn mark and companies are already drawing up contracts. War, it seems, is good to the construction industry.

Some would make an even stronger connection between war and construction.

Dr David Keen of the London School of Economics, a specialist on the subject, suggests that when the Bush administration created an Office of the Co-ordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization in 2004, and gave it a mandate to draw up detailed post-conflict plans for up to 25 countries that were not, as yet, in conflict, it was effectively laying down the ground rules for a profitable system based on a “bomb and build” cycle.

Says Keen: “We need to know more about the political connections between the construction industry and those advocating a destructive

(but in many respects profitable) War on Terror. The fact that ‘reconstruction’ is already being co-ordinated before the destruction is deeply disturbing.”

Whether you subscribe to Keen’s view or not, there is no doubt that construction in many war-torn Middle Eastern countries takes place in a politically charged atmosphere. In Lebanon, in the aftermath of the recent fighting, the political landscape has been redrawn and Hezbollah, which combines a militia with a political party and a social development programme, is firmly in charge.

The question is: who will control the rebuilding? On one hand is the appropriately named Construction Jihad, Hezbollah’s construction arm, which is funded largely by Iran. On the other are the Western powers, led by the US. For the firms bidding for work in the area, and the countries that provide aid for restoration, the answer to the question is crucial.

Construction companies, whether contractors, QS, architects or engineers have always profited in the aftermath of war. Since 2003 Iraq has proved a happy contractual hunting ground for a select group of British firms. AMEC tops the list with half a billion pounds worth of work but others, including QS firm Baker Wilkins as well as more familiar names like Costain, Mowlem, Mott McDonald and Foster Wheeler, have all secured millions of pounds worth of building or infrastructural work in post-Saddam Iraq. But then British firms serviced Saddam’s regime too – our country has had interests in the resource-rich country stretching back decades.

Major contracts

Many contractors are preparing for the reconstruction and looking at ways to resource the labour

Evan Anderson

Following its battering by the Israeli military, Lebanon is the latest billion dollar rebuild planned for the Middle East. British companies are well established in the Levantine nation. Many firms, such as Davis Langdon, had major contracts lined up before the recent conflict.

Currently procuring a hospital maintenance contract in Beirut, Blair Anderson is one British company already involved in reconstructing the country’s shattered towns and cities (see box). Director Evan Anderson puts the situation in context: “Prior to the conflict, Lebanon was experiencing a building boom but now many contractors are preparing themselves for the reconstruction process and looking at ways to resource the labour and materials needed.” According to Anderson, Syrian manpower was the mainstay of the Lebanese construction industry but thousands fled when the conflict began. Furthermore, products and materials have been affected by the Israeli embargo.

In the meantime, notes Anderson, Construction Jihad has filled the void. Despite being bombed out of its headquarters in southern Beirut, it has been on hand to both survey the destruction and organise labour. “They were first to help restore water and electricity to towns such as Bint Jbeil, the party’s main stronghold in southern Lebanon,” says Anderson.

So with billions of dollars now pledged for the rebuild it looks as if construction industry will profit once more from the bomb and build cycle. But the political overtones remain. Many of those donors, including the EU, the US, Syria and Russia, will want reassurance that it’s the Lebanese government, and not Hezbollah, that is controlling the rebuilding.

However, a hefty chunk of the money that will fuel the Lebanese recovery is likely to come from one of the West’s principal foes – Iran.

The New York Times recently reported that the fundamentalist Shia state was ready to provide Hezbollah with an “unlimited budget” for reconstruction.

Anyone who has visited Construction Jihad’s temporary HQ will have seen the large wall chart that details damage to individual properties in Beirut, zone by zone. Headed up by 48-year-old industrial engineer Kassem Allaik, its aim, he says ominously, is to build a society of resistance. He told the FT: “Our aim is to create the conditions so people can stay on their land to confront the enemy.”

Perhaps then, to land the bigger reconstruction contracts, UK consultants will have to comply with Hezbollah, by using subcontractors favoured by the radical political party. If they do, it would be no different to the conditions laid down by the US government to UK firms wanting a slice of the Iraqi reconstruction pie.