Don’t give N$255m classroom tender to Chinese firms – union tells August 26

The Metal and Allied Namibian Workers Union (Manwu) general secretary, Justina Jonas, supports the awarding of the N$255-million tender to the state-owned construction company August 26, but warns it should not pass the tender on to Chinese companies.

The Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture has hand-picked August 26 to build 510 school classrooms and 70 ablution blocks without publicly advertising the tender.

This decision was met with opposition from industry players accusing the government of fuelling unfair competition.

Manwu both supports and criticises August 26.

“It is a state-owned company and needs to be a part of this tender. One of our calls as a union is to make sure that local entities are empowered by the government,” Jonas told Desert Radio yesterday.

She, however, expressed concern over the subcontractors August 26 chooses to engage, saying the military company appoints companies that eventually sell contracts to Chinese entities.

“This could be because they give the subcontracts to people who do not have the capacity, and they, in turn, sell them to the Chinese contractors. This does not sit well with us,” Jonas said.

She also expressed the union’s concern over the alleged non-compliance to labour rights.

“We have exposed it many times, and we will continue to talk about this, since August 26 is a state-owned enterprise – they need to lead by example,” Jonas said.

She asked tender beneficiaries to empower local entities they bring on board to strengthen the sector.

DEFENDER OF THE DEAL

Deputy executive director of education, arts and culture, Edda Bohn, says the ministry gave the deal to August 26 by following national tender laws, which allow direct procurement.

She said the ministry is aware of complaints about the awarding of the tender, and the matter must be “seen in the context of the ministry having limited funding”.

“Timelines and budgets should not restrain us if there are other opportunities through which we can reach the goalpost,” she said.

When asked about August 26’s tarnished reputation, Bohn said concerns about mismanagement and the misappropriation of funds are widespread in the government sector.

Bohn maintained that August 26 was the ministry’s best option, and that the entity usually subcontracts smaller local companies and supervises them.

WORK DONE

She said the expansion of the schoolgoing population not positively correlating with infrastructure development has created a backlog.

“Over the past three years we have been working on what we call the accelerated infrastructure development plan, which identifies over 4 000 classrooms that are needed,” she said.

“This is why, with the available funds, we negotiated with August 26 to build these classrooms,” she said.

According to Bohn, August 26 has already covered up to 90% of the sites, and 37 sites of 510 were half completed by the beginning of September.

“We are anticipating that between now and the beginning of the new school year all of these sites will be completed,” she said.

Bohn said the government needs to complete 1 248 classrooms this year.

“This portion . . . is what is called the basic education facility funding, which is N$279 million, but there are allocations made and further negotiations with stakeholders to meet the need for the 1 248 classrooms.

EMPOWERING LOCALS

Earlier this month, the chief executive of the Construction Industry Federation, Barbel Kirchner, said: “It is understood that August 26 would involve staff from the Ministry of Defence and Veterans Affairs. This would lead to unfair competition.”

She said according to the records of the CIF, August 26 does not have sufficient capacity to execute the work as the company reportedly has an annual construction turnover of less than N$5 million.

In turn, August 26 Construction managing director Martha Endjala said she would prefer to use the Namibian workforce.

“August 26 Construction has successfully completed 500 classrooms in a record time of five months and within budget.

“How can one accomplish this under a cost of N$5 million, using soldiers with no construction skills? August 26 Construction is a fully sustainable company, honouring its own liabilities and paying its expenses from the income generated through its own operations,” she said.