The State Department for Housing and Urban Development is on the spot for giving one bidder an unfair advantage in the Sh2.1 billion tender for the construction of affordable houses.
According to the public procurement watchdog, the department failed to apply fairness and overlooked the errors and alterations in the tender documents submitted by Jasir Contractors, which was picked as the successful bidder for the Loitoktok affordable housing project, Kajiado County.
The Public Procurement Administrative Review Board questioned why Jasir Contractors Limited won the tender while its documents exhibited glaring errors yet its competitor in the tendering process, Jijenge Precast & Construction Limited, was disqualified over similar errors.
“The tender evaluation committee disqualified Jijenge based on modifications and inconsistencies in the Bill of Quantities (BoQ), yet the successful bidder exhibited multiple discrepancies, including omissions/alterations and inconsistencies in unit rates in its BoQ,” said the board’s panel chaired by Mr Joshua Kiptoo.
Consequently, the board has cancelled the State Department’s intention to issue Jasir the contract and directed it to re-evaluate Jijenge’s bid, taking into consideration the board’s findings.
“The successful bidder had multiple inconsistencies in rate uniformity and glaring alteration on its bid. Despite the discrepancies, the procuring entity found the successful bidder responsive while disqualifying the applicant for similar or lesser deviations,” said the board while ruling on a review application filed by Jijenge.
The tender was for the proposed construction of 1,000 units in Loitoktok affordable housing project, Kajiado South Constituency, Kajiado County with associated infrastructure.
The State Department intended to issue the tender to Jasir Contractors Limited, which emerged as the lowest bidder after quoting Sh2.1 billion.
However, the board cancelled the letter of notification of intention to award the tender issued to Jasir Contractors and directed the State department to conduct a re-evaluation of the Jijenge’s bid at the financial stage within 21 days.
It added that according to the evaluation criteria, completeness of BoQ without alteration was a key requirement.
The board further stated that the evaluation committee’s report provided no justification as to why the successful bidder’s errors, alterations, omissions and commissions were overlooked while Jijenge’s bid was deemed non-responsive for lesser discrepancies.
“The differential treatment resulted in an unfair advantage to one bidder. Not every error should automatically result in the disqualification of a tender. Only errors that affect the substance of a tender and cannot be remedied. The identified errors (in Jijenge’s tender) do not, in any way, alter the substance of the tender,” said the board.
The board added that the Evaluation committee erred by failing to uphold principles of fairness, transparency and equal treatment as enshrined in the Public procurement and Asset Disposal Act.
“The board is guided by the principles of fairness, transparency and equal treatment as enshrined in the Public Procurement and Asset Disposal Act, 2015. The Act requires the evaluation committee to apply criteria uniformly. Public procurement regulations mandates that all bidders be treated fairly and consistently,” it ruled.
Other bidders included Landmark Holdings Limited, Frontier Engineering Limited and Parkland Construction Limited.
In response, the State department defended its decision saying that it strictly followed the evaluation criteria as provided in the tender documents.
It emphasised that Jijenge was disqualified due to non-compliance with the requirement for completeness of the Bill of Quantities. It said there was no prejudice in assessment of Jijenge’s bid.
The board, however, observed that the State department disqualified Jijenge due to modification/inconsistencies in the BoQ yet Jasir Contractors exhibited multiple discrepancies including omission/alteration in its BoQ.
More specifically, rates for the same line item differ across pages contrary to financial evaluation requirements.
