While the Bid Protest Committee (BPC) under the Procurement Act has been established, it is yet to start the official review of its first complaint as some procedures have not been made clear to officials at the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB).
“We received a letter from NPTAB saying the committee received our protest and so on and we should pay a fee but when we got there no one could tell us where we had to pay and there seemed to be confusion,” representative of the Cevon’s consortium, Morse Archer told Stabroek News yesterday.
“So we have to go back Monday (today) to sort it out. However, that is not all. They state we should pay a 1% but we do not know 1% of what, so that too had to be sorted out,” he added.
The BPC received its first protest from the Cevons Waste Management Group on the grounds that a $221M contract for the management and maintenance of the Haags Bosch landfill on the East Bank Demerara had been improperly awarded to Puran Brothers Disposal Inc.
The letter referenced by Archer is dated July 28th 2016 and informs the company that the NPTAB received correspondence for a review from the company, dated July 12th 2016.
“As you are aware the Bid Protest Committee has been recently established. You will be informed regarding the date and time of the hearing…In accordance with Part V Section 13 (2) Administrative Review of the regulations made under the Procurement Act of 2003 there is a registration fee attached to each bid protest,” the letter reads.
“The registration fee applied is $50,000.00 and 1% of the estimated value of the procurement,” it added while saying that Archer should contact the Chief Executive Officer of the NPTAB regarding making the payment.
Archer informed that when he went last week to the NPTAB to make the payment, he was told to “hold on” as it was not clear where the monies are to be deposited. He said he will be returning to the NPTAB today to ascertain not only where the monies have to be paid but to get an explanation of “what exactly 1% of procurement” means.
“We don’t know if its 1% of the Engineer’s estimate, our estimate or Puran’s estimate. The thing is that the contract is a monthly contract ($27M per month) so is it 1% of that? All these things we have to find out tomorrow,” Archer said.
Attorney Joann Bond will now head the recently-constituted BPC. Her appointment comes after the government had earlier announced the appointment of Renee McDonald of the Ministry of Legal Affairs as the Chairperson of the BPC.
The three-member committee was established in July and comprised McDonald as the Chair-man and former GTT General Manager Archibald Clifton and Insurance Broker Ewart Adams as the other two members. McDonald has since resigned.
Puran Brothers has defended its credentials and rubbished the claims that the contract award was unfair, even as it made clear that it recognised the right of protest and will stand by the BPC’s decision.
The procuring agency, the Ministry of Communities also went public and rejected the Cevons Group’s claims. In a statement last Monday, it reiterated that all “reasonable standards and procedures of civility, ethics and integrity were followed.”
Both Cevons and Puran’s will have to wait until the BPC deliberates over the protest document submitted.
The latter company’s General Manager Kaleshwar Puran had told this newspaper that all work pertaining to the contract has ceased and this has tied up investments he has made towards the contract. He, too, is anticipating a speedy resolution to the case and revealed that no details have been forthcoming from the authorities to his company.
According to the Procurement Act, the BPC, after receipt of the protest, shall issue a written decision within 15 business days of the conclusion of a review, stating the reasons for the decision and the remedies granted, if any. Its decision shall be final.
It says that damages may include only compensation to recover the cost of the bid preparation. The final contract award is suspended during this period.
As it pertains to a fee to be charged, Section 13 (2) of the Regulations made under the Act, provides for a complaint to be accompanied by a registration fee determined by the Administration and posted on its website. Checks by this newspaper on the NPTAB website found no evidence of any fee posted.
At a European Union and Cariforum capacity-building public procurement training seminar last month, Junior Finance Minister Jaipaul Sharma had said that his ministry would be working out the fee costs and soon would let the public know as they would not want to see the BPC flooded with frivolous protests.
Former Auditor General Anand Goolsarran also pointed out yesterday that he also checked to ascertain what the fees were and could not find any reference to it.
And while he believes that a fee should be instituted, he said that fee should not be a deterrent to aggrieved bidders.
“I agree that a fee should be charged to act as a deterrent against frivolous complaints. At the same time, the fee charged must be reasonable and must not be such that complainants do not consider it worthwhile to register a complaint,” Goolsarran said.
