-says only eight of 32 bidders were compliant
Government yesterday defended the contract awards for the construction of the $11.8 billion Schoonord-to-Crane Highway insisting that the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) followed all legal procurement steps.
It disclosed that only eight of the 32 bids were responsive. Questions have been raised about the decisions being made by the evaluation committees of the NPTAB.
“The NPTAB accepted the recommendations made by the Evaluators based on their representations regarding the respective contractors’ capacity to execute the individual lots in a timely manner, given the urgency within which the project was required to be completed,” a release from the Ministry of Finance stated.
“The NPTAB remains committed to ensuring an open, fair, competitive, and transparent public procurement process,” it added.
There was no word on if any of the contractors had faced any liquidated damages penalties.
The road project contract which was inked in September, 2022, for just over $11.8 billion had been awarded to eight contractors via the national procurement process. The winning contractors were VR Construction Inc, Avinash Contracting & Scrap Metal Inc, L’Heureuse Construction and Services Inc, GuyAmerica Construction Inc, AJM Enterprise, Vals Construction, Puran Bros Disposal Inc, and JS Guyana Inc.
The release followed a call from Alliance for Change Leader Nigel Hughes that Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo should provide tangible evidence of adherence to the Public Procurement Act regarding the Schoonord Highway construction project, after Jagdeo held a procurement forum issuing a stern warning and pointing out penalties for non-adherence.
“The Vice President, Mr. Bharrat Jagdeo, has apparently issued a stern warning to heads of accounting officers of public sector agencies to enforce strict compliance with procurement rules. The Vice President had previously emphasized the importance of adherence to the Procurement Act and the necessity for fairness in awarding contracts…,” Hughes wrote in a letter to the Editor.
A lawyer, Hughes pointed out that the Procurement Act provides for the regulation of the procurement of goods, services and the execution of works, to promote competition among suppliers and contractors and to promote fairness and transparency in the procurement process.
“It sets out the procedures for the management of public procurement. Section 42(1) of the Procurement Act states that ‘…the tender that has been identified as the lowest evaluated tender shall be accepted’,” he said.
Producing three tables with all of the bidders for the lots and their respective tenders, he analyzed that the vast majority had lower sums than the contractors awarded.
“As can be seen from the tables above for Lot 3 there were 18 bidders lower than the contract awardee L’Heureuse Construction and Services Inc; for Lot 5 there were 20 bidders lower than the contract awardee AJM Enterprise; for Lot 6 there were 11 bidders lower than the contract awardee Vals Construction; for Lot 7 there were 5 bidders lower than the contract awardee Puran Brothers, and for Lot 8 there were 7 bidders lower than the contract awardee JS Guyana Inc,” he stated.
“In all cases there were contractors with equal or superior experience who had lower tender prices. The National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) in all the cited cases, based on the awards, would have us believe that none of the tenders with lower bid prices were deemed ‘evaluated’ which strains credulity,” he added.
Pointing to Lot 4, Hughes said it was the “most egregious and strains credulity to breaking point,” given that a bid with hundreds of millions more over the Engineer’s Estimate was chosen.
“NPTAB seemingly dispensed with the concept of the lowest evaluated bidder altogether by awarding the contract to the highest bidder – GuyAmerica Construction Inc – and they did so at a price that was $690 million dollars above the Engineer’s Estimate,” Hughes outlined.
“If the Guyanese people are to be convinced of the Vice President’s sincerity and commitment to adherence of public procurement to the Procurement Act, he would do well to provide tangible evidence that these contract awards were indeed in accordance with the said act,” he added.
At a press conference he hosted on Thursday, Jagdeo said that he had asked the Finance Ministry which holds oversight for NPTAB to respond to Hughes letter.
Yesterday, the response was issued and stated that the awards were above board.
“It is important to emphasise that the Open Tendering method, the most competitive and transparent procurement method, was used. Thirty-two (32) bidders submitted tenders which were evaluated strictly in accordance with the Evaluation Criteria. Eight (8) of the bidders were compliant with the administrative and technical criteria set out in the bidding documents. As such, these bidders were deemed responsive and were considered for further evaluation, while those who were non-responsive were not further evaluated,” the statement said.
“Each bidder was limited to one lot and evaluated based on the combination of the contractor’s resources, experience and capacity to execute the works within the stipulated timeline and scope of works. Based on the foregoing, the evaluators recommended that the lots be awarded to the following bidders:Lot 1: VR Construction Inc;Lot 2: Avinash Construction and Scrap Metal Inc;Lot 3: L-Heureuse and Services Inc;Lot 4: Guyamerica Construction Inc;Lot 5: AJM Enterprise;Lot 6: Vals Construction;Lot 7: Puran Bros Disposal Inc and Lot 8: J S Guyana Inc,” it added.
Concerns have also been raised about substandard works on the $11.8 billion project, which President Irfaan Ali dismissed as “empty noises,” saying that some of the works being highlighted were incomplete.
“There is absolutely no concern about Schoonord [road project]. I shared… some information because there are some drain covers. These are covers where the form [board] still has to be removed and this is ongoing,” Ali had told Stabroek News, earlier this month when asked about the issue.
“And there is a long defects liability period. So it is just empty noises,” he added.
Ali had trumpeted that the project was a subset of the overall increased accessibility around the country by land, pointing out that one adjustment to add another exit was highlighted and was to be done that weekend.
