City Hall ‘bidding’

Cebu City Hall’s Bid and Awards Committee (BAC) will open today the public bidding for the city’s garbage disposal for the next four months. The amount involved is P124 million. According to BAC chief Ronald Malacora, three companies are joining the bidding. These are Jomara Konstruck Inc., the former service provider; Pasajero Motors Corp. (Pamocor), the current provider, and a newscomer, Quirante Construction.

Jomara lost to Pamocor in the bidding for the month of June due to mere technically even if it offered the lowest bid compared with Pamocor, owned by Kasambagan barangay captain and businessman Franklin Ong, a close ally of the Bando Osmeña-Pundok Kauswagan (BOPK).

Malacora said that after the opening of the bidding documents, the Technical Working Group (TWG) will scrutinize all the records submitted by the bidders in a post-qualification bid. These include the legal documents and requirements by other government agencies such as business permits, tax clearance from the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) and Environmental Compliance Certificate from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR).

The BAC will also inspect the technical capability of the bidders as to the kinds of equipment they would dispatch and their financial capability.

I am not a fortune teller, but I can predict that this huge contract will be awarded again to Pamocor. Why? Because this bidding is only for show. “Bidding-bidding” ra man ni aron ingnon nga naay bidding.

Consider this. In its bidding for the contract for the month of June, ontract, Pamocor challenged Jomara and the former won through mere technicality. Jomara failed to submit its tax clearance certificate from the BIR. But it was not entirely Jomara’s fault. BIR failed to release the certificate on time. The bidding was conducted on May 16; BIR released the tax certificate on May 19. BAC did not consider Jomara’s appeal.

Pamocor was able to submit all the legal requirements but it was not ready technically. That’s why in the first few weeks of their operation and until now, it miserably failed to deliver a satisfactory performance. Garbage collected from the barangays are piling up at the transfer station in Inayawan because Pamocor failed to dispose on time these to a private sanitary landfill in Consolacion.

May I ask these questions to BAC members: Before the contract was awarded to Pamocor, did BAC scrutinize well its track record? Did it conduct physical inspection and inventory on the kind and number of heavy equipment Pamocor could dispatch during the actual operation.

Malacora said its not a matter of which bidder offered the lowest bid but the capability of the bidder to efficiently deliver what are stipulated in the contract. Okey, pero palpak man lagi ang Pamocor?

We are not born yesterday. Biddings are conducted just to satisfy Commission on Audit (COA) rules and regulations. But biddings can be manipulated.