Major breaches were seen in pump station award to Tepui
-but procurement commission says unable to do anything as contract already signed
More than six months after a complaint was lodged by APNU+AFC MP David Patterson about a pump station contract award to Tepui Inc, the procurement commission found major breaches in the evaluation process but said it can do nothing about it as a contract has already been concluded.
The Public Procurement Commission (PPC) yesterday issued a summary of findings since Patterson was not an aggrieved party and only entitled to recommendations on the way forward.
The PPC said “…on the entry into a contract, privity of contract issues arise. There is nothing within the statutory framework which permits the commission to revoke, rescind, recall and or in any way alter, suspend or stop the contract once entered”.
The PPC’s findings released yesterday will call into question its effectiveness in addressing contract irregularities particularly where a bidder does not lodge a complaint within the prescribed period. Bidders are loathe to do this for fear of being
excluded from future consideration of projects.
The award of the $865m Belle Vue Pump Station to Tepui Inc had raised questions from the outset as its key principal Mikhail Rodrigues was not involved in construction but was known to be a confidant of Vice-President Bharrat Jagdeo and with
ready access to government.
In its 35-page summary, the PPC elicited answers from the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) – whose evaluation committee made the choice of Tepui – and the procuring agency, the National Drainage and
Irrigation Authority (NDIA). Not only were both tardy in answering the PPC, they only provided some of the documents requested.
Tepui was required to have had the experience of having completed one project of a similar nature within the past five years. Similar projects “shall include pump stations, sluices and drainage structures”. Having been incorporated less than a year before, Tepui did not have these qualifications, yet the evaluation committee of the NPTAB found its bid to be responsive.
When the PPC asked the NPTAB and the NDIA to justify their decision, they cited what they described as similar-type of works which Tepui had done for other clients. They also admitted that two other tenderers for pump stations were similarly not qualified but that “lenience” was showed.
The summary of findings said that the record before the PPC reflects that Tepui submitted two contracts under this criterion heading, to wit:
i. a contract between it and Hadi’s World Inc. dated March 27th, 2023, for the construction of a concrete wharf at Providence, and ii. a contract between it and the Central Housing and