MPs are investigating the multimillion-shilling tender wars over the on-site support for Integrated Financial Management Information System (Ifmis).
The tender for the on-site support for Ifmis applications, enhancement of Ifmis E-procurement and independent integrated financial management information system for Semi-Autonomous Government Agency (SAGA) was awarded to a consortium led by Kingsway Business Systems Limited at Sh647.06 million.
However, ADK Technologies Limited, in a consortium with Transnational Computer Technology Limited, had their Sh898.95 million bid rejected by the National Treasury, the procuring entity.
The tender was categorised into two lots – lot one had on-site support for Ifmis applications and enhancement of Ifmis E-procurement and lot two had provision of independent Ifmis for Semi-Autonomous Government Agency (SAGA)- NYS.
In a petition to Parliament, the ADK-led consortium accuses National Treasury Principal Secretary Julius Muia of irregularly awarding the Kingsway-led consortium the tender.
The petition by Mr Wond Wossen Mesfin on behalf of ADK-led consortium, claims that had Dr Muia done due diligence and background checks, the Kingsway-led consortium should not have been awarded the tender.
“The tender process initiated and carried out by the procuring entity is devoid of fairness, equitability, transparency, competitiveness and illegal and full of forgery and deceit and collusion,” Mr Mesfin claims in the petition before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of the National Assembly.
Mr Mesfin has petitioned the watchdog committee chaired by Ugunja MP Opiyo Wandayi to find the award process is discriminatory contrary to the constitution and the Public Procurement and Asset Disposal Act.
Kingsway consortium managed a combined technical and financial score of 92.06 percent compared to 82.19 percent awarded to ADK led consortium.
“As a consequence of the procuring entity’s action of evaluating the tenders in a manner contrary to the objectives of the law it ended up scoring higher points for the successful bidder than they deserved and simultaneously scoring lower points for our consortium,” says Mr Mesfin.
He said the procuring entity failed to comply with the due diligence procedure as provided for in the procurement law.
On Monday, Mr Wandayi told Nation that his committee will be fair in the probe.
“As a committee, we are fully seized of the matter.
“We will endeavour to accord every party a fair hearing and come up with a determination that will guide the way forward,” said Mr Wandayi.
Dr Muia, who appeared before the committee last week, defended the tender as above board.
The management of the Kingsway-led consortium are expected to appear before the committee on Thursday. The petitioner claims that as per the tender document, the technical mandatory criteria was that all bidders for the tender were required to meet a certain threshold.
This included a minimum of two Oracle Partner Specialization or Advanced Specialization for the requested products- Oracle EBS Financial, Oracle EBS Supply Chain, Oracle SOA, Oracle Hyperion, Oracle BI and Oracle Database and Options.
“Our consortium fully complied with this requirement. The successful bidder – Kingsway Business Systems led consortium failed to comply,” the petitioner says.
The petitioner claims that when the illegality was discovered, a complaint was lodged to the accounting officer of the procuring entity in August 2020 but has never been acted on to date.
The ADK led consortium had an appeal filed at the Public Procurement Administrative Review Board (PPARB) but was dismissed for want of jurisdiction.
