Atlantic denies Swapo influence

ATLANTIC Food Services has defended its catering tender and denied that the letter written by one of its shareholders, the Swapo Party Women’s Council, ‘played an inappropriate role’ during tender allocations in May 2009.

Johannes Nicolaas Eigelaar, CEO of Conger Investments, a registered company trading under the name of Atlantic Food Services, said in his answering affidavit filed on Friday at the High Court that the primary reason for the allocation of two northern hostel regions to Atlantic Food Services was the price factor. He said Atlantic Food Services was awarded the tender because it submitted the lowest bid.He acknowledged that a letter was written by the SPWC, which owns 10 per cent shares in Atlantic Food Services, but said it was written in response to ‘rumours (heard by the SPWC) that the adjudicating committee may propose recommending that the third respondent be disqualified.’ The letter, he said, was written on an Atlantic Food Services letterhead. ‘I do not dispute that the letter by the SPWC was sent after tenders had closed and before they were awarded. I deny that it constitutes inappropriate influence in any way.’He also stated that the letter was sent because Atlantic Food Services ‘would have been entitled to be heard with regard to its proposed disqualification’.Eigelaar also challenged the right of the adjudication committee to disqualify any bidder from the proceedings and denied that Atlantic Food Services was ever fully disqualified from the tender.Although he admits that adjudication committee ‘initially proposed the disqualification of Atlantic Food Services … it was not authorised to disqualify any tender. Nor could it.’Eigelaar said the proposed disqualification was based on the ‘committee’s incorrect interpretation of tender requirements and [Atlantic Food Services] tender’.He questioned the reasons for the ‘proposed re-commendation of disqualification of Atlantic Food Services’ saying that the adjudication committee’s reasons ‘were not, I submit, sound’.According to Eigelaar, the Adjudication Committee had merely recommended the disqualification in its first draft submission to the Tender Committee, stating that ‘since the tenderer does not comply with the main compulsory criteria of the tender bond, performance bond and overdraft facility were not issued in the name of the tenderer, the tenderer is therefore disqualified (sic).’ In addition, the affidavit notes that the initial reference of disqualification from the adjudication committee ‘was in the form of a draft recommendation’ and that ‘it was in any event not for this committee to disqualify any tenderer’.Further allegations from Free Namibia Caterers speculated that tender regulations were altered following the appeal from Atlantic Food Services to be reinstated in the tender bid. Charles Kabajani, a senior official in the Ministry of Education, wrote a letter on behalf of Atlantic Food Services to the Ministerial Tender Committee, in which he praised the company’s social responsibility intentions and pointed out the significant costs savings the Ministry would make should it allocate the tender to Atlantic.