It’s a case of too little, too late in tender row

PRETORIA: Dimension Data, a bidder to provide, supply and maintain digital recording solutions to courts countrywide at a cost of R500 million, lost its legal tussle on a technical point against the minister of Justice and rival Datacentrix.

The company had launched an urgent bid in the high court in Pretoria in which it wanted the minister to provisionally halt the implementation of the tender awarded to Datacentrix, pending review proceedings.

The three-year tender was advertised in June 2014 and subsequently awarded to Datacentrix in January last year. Dimension Data previously provided the service, but its new bid was unsuccessful.

The previous courtrecording system was known as DCRS, and Acting Judge Anneli Basson said it was common cause that the system was outdated.

Dimension Data also wanted an order to maintain the status quo and permit it to continue providing recording and support services to the courts on a month-to-month basis.

The company said the application was urgent as the tender had already been awarded. The court was told that Dimension Data found out about the award in February last year, and about the fact that the project-implementation phase was to commence two months later.

One of the company’s objections to the tender being awarded to its rival was that Datacentrix’s bid price was higher than Dimension Data’s.

Judge Basson said Dimension Data already actively participated in phasing out the old DCRS system in June last year. Yet the company chose to approach the court only more than a year later to halt the tender.

“Dimension Data was aware of the fact that the tender was awarded as far back as January 29 last year. In letters of February last year, Dimension Data already identified some of the alleged irregularities… There is no reason why the urgent application could not have been launched in May or June last year,” she said.

She said Dimension Data created its own urgency by only launching these proceedings now, which were in any case late as its rival had already been operating the system for some time.

“It cannot be overlooked that the court-recording technology has, for all practical purposes, been installed. As at June this year, 908 courtrooms have been installed with the new system and Dimension Data has removed 544 of the old DCRS equipment.”

The judge added it was not disputed that by the end of this month the installation of the new system would be completed.

Finding that the matter was not urgent, she struck it from the roll. This means Dimension Data will have to wait its turn on the normal roll if it wanted to fight further.