Public Works: Final Deadline (Calculation) – Right to Terminate the Contract

Article 161(2) of Law 4412/2016 (formerly Article 62(2), Law 3669/2008) states that: "…the contractor may request the termination of the contract: (a) …, (b) …, (c) …, (d) If the delay in the work, without the contractor's fault exceeds the limit limit limit." Moreover, Article 147(7) of the same Act (ex Article 48(7), Law 3669/2008) provides that: ‘The contractor is obliged to continue the construction of the project for a period, in addition to the total deadline, equal to one third (1/3) of it and, however, not less than three (3) months (limit period). The total period shall be calculated on the basis of the initial contractual period and any extensions adopted at the request of the contractor within the initial contractual period and shall not be due to its fault, in paragraph 8: ‘An extension of the total or partial deadlines shall be approved: a) or by revision’, where the delay in all work of the project or the corresponding section is not due to the sole fault of the contractor or results from an increase in the original contractual object’ and paragraph 10: ‘The approval of the time-limits shall be made by the Chief Authority at the request of the Contractor to the Management Service’. It follows from the above provisions that the contractor has the right to request the termination of the contract due to the expiry of the limit period of the project without its fault, and to calculate the above limit period shall be taken into account in the initial (conventional) deadline and the extended, at the request of the contractor, of the total period of the project, provided that such application has been submitted within the original contractual period and is not due to the extension of the contractor's liability. Therefore, the contractor is not prevented from submitting an application for termination of the contract, after the expiry of the time limit, for the calculation of which the approved, on request, has been taken into account, within the initial contractual period, of an extension of the total duration of the project, even if he has submitted, after the initial contractual period, a new application for an extension of the overall period of the project, approved by the Chief Authority (see FIE 4365/2014, FIE 1981/2014, FIE 4410/2011). In addition, the contracting party’s ability to request the dissolution of an administrative contract, provided that the above legal conditions are met, results from a public law relationship, in which neither Article 281 of the A.C. applies, concerning the prohibition of abuse of a right concerning the exercise of private rights, nor the provision of Article 25(3) of the Constitution, on the abuse of an individual right by that body (BSE 4365/2014).