•  December 2000February 2001 Local News Headlines

Thursday, March 1, 2001 - Web posted at 7:37:27 AM GMT

Pension tender delay 'due to corruption'
WERNER MENGES

THE Tender Board's decision in 1999 not to award the contract for the delivery of State pensions to the cheapest bidder was an effort to protect the integrity of the tendering process from corrupt attempts to influence it, it was argued in the High Court in Windhoek yesterday.

The hearing of applications by unsuccessful tenderers Cash Paymaster Services (CPS) and JMS Investments CC to have the award of the contract to United Africa (Namibia) overturned is set to continue before Judge Sylvester Mainga on May 2.

Yesterday Government Attorney Vicki Erenstein ya Toivo, representing the Tender Board, read in full the document which she said had brought the parties to court.

It was a letter from a previous tenderer, Ewe Enterprises CC, proposing to CPS that Ewe would withdraw its then lowest tender for the job so that CPS would get the contract.

The Ewe letter was signed by George Simataa, Under Secretary in the Office of the Prime Minister, and businessman Immanuel Dumeni, a former senior official in the same office.

In return for that proposed arrangement, which would have cost Government and the Namibian taxpayer N$4,8 million a year more, Ewe wanted CPS to pay it a "commission" of N$3,78 million a year.

Over the contract's three-year span, Ewe would have earned over N$11,3 million for doing nothing other than dropping out of the tender process.

However, CPS exposed the proposal.

Having read the letter to the court, Ya Toivo said at heart the case was about the integrity of tenders for Government procurements.

When the Tender Board decided not to award the pensions contract to JMS, which offered to do it for N$15,6 million a year, and gave it to United Africa (Namibia), which tendered N$17,7 million, it was above all trying to safeguard the integrity of the tender process, she contended.

The Tender Board decided not to give the contract to JMS, whose sole member is Manfred Namaseb, because that corporation had associated itself with people who had corruptly tried to influence the tender award previously through the Ewe proposal, she said.

Simataa and Dumeni, who Namaseb admits knowing personally, accompanied Namaseb to various JMS meetings.

Among these, Dumeni went with Namaseb to the Ministry of Health and Social Services for a presentation on JMS's tender, and Simataa joined Namaseb for a meeting with former Attorney General Vekuii Rukoro at which Namaseb complained about the way the Tender Board was handling the pensions tender.

Because of these claimed ties, the Ministry of Health and Social Services recommended to the Tender Board not to award the contract to JMS.

The integrity of JMS, the Ministry said, had been tarnished by its association with agents of Ewe whose previous actions in the tendering process had been tantamount to corrupt practices.

The Ministry's role was one of the factors in the tender process attacked by JMS's lawyer, Reinhard Toetemeyer, and CPS's counsel, Pieter Henning, SC, this week.

They argued that the real decisions about the award of the Tender had been made not by the Tender Board, but, improperly, by the Health Ministry.

For that reason, the tender award had to be set aside, they submitted.

Henning also charged that the need for transparency, which is a constitutional right, was completely ignored during the process.

At the very least the Tender Board should have had a fair hearing before it made its decision, he said.

He further accused the Board of having disqualified CPS from the first tender for the contract - in which Ewe had submitted the lowest tender - simply because a Social Security Commission certificate that the company was in good standing with the SSC was not stamped and dated, and without having informed CPS of that requirement or having given it a chance to respond to that complaint.

Erenstein ya Toivo is scheduled to continue with her address to the court on May 2.

•  City Council takes back B1 City plot
•  Jacobs corruption probe not yet finished
•  Roessing pushing for 2030
•  Lawyer issue delays cop's trial
•  N$400m waterfront project to start soon
•  De-mining in Angola speeds up
•  Community service a viable alternative to prison: Minister
•  Gazza, The Dogg to share stage
•  Parastatal confirms financial squeeze
•  No action against cops in elephant case
•  SA police seize truck, impound cigarettes from Nam
•  SA heavyweights on bench for Teek appeal
•  Govt newspaper tender re-advertised
•  Damara chiefs to discuss differences
•  Murdered woman found at Rehoboth
•  Warden in court over fuel
•  Swakop is IT, says television producer
•  New conservancy launched in Caprivi
•  Rape, murder, robbery mark long weekend
•  Enviro magazine on way
•  By-election date announced
•  Insurers 'bleeding the common man'
•  TransNamib in dire straits