Irregularities alleged in City tender

The controversy that has dogged the Solid Waste Management Division at the City of Windhoek is refusing to die.

It is now being claimed that the current 16 ward contractors are in the pole position to again win the tenders for open space and street cleaning services for the next five years. The tenders for the open space and street cleaning services, which were outsourced in 2006 under the Ward Contractor System (WCS), come to an end next month. Tender No INF 586/2011 was advertised in June and the closing date was Friday July 15 2011.The tender requirements specify that successful bidders must have experience in waste management training and similar fields amongst others. These two requirements are considered by those in the know as the ‘excluding’ factors for prospective bidders for the City’s street cleaning services.The current 16 contractors, most of whom were previous supervisors at the division are said to now have a competitive edge for the tenders.This is because they had received waste management training through Cape Peninsula Technikon while they were still employed by the City of Windhoek. Special courses which were waste and financial management related were allegedly also organised for them at Polytechnic at the expense of the City of Windhoek, insiders claim.’The current 16 contractors are in a beneficial (sic) position and it is to the disadvantage of new tenderers,’ a source said.All 16 contractors had bought a Hyundai mini truck – a deal facilitated by the City through Standard Bank Namibia.The Solid Waste Management Division has been the subject of an Ernst and Young forensic audit since the beginning of the year. The auditors are currently briefing the City management and the unions on their preliminary findings. One such meeting is planned for Friday.City of Windhoek Chief Executive Officer Niilo Taapopi had earlier indicated that the forensic audit exercise will soon be over, after which the auditors will brief the council on their findings.The forensic probe commenced in January this year and was done at the insistence of the Namibia Public Workers Union (Napwu).The investigation is looking at unravelling various allegations made by Napwu, which are related to the process leading to the outsourcing of city street cleaning services. It’s also expected to probe the purchase and maintenance of six waste-removal trucks. The trucks were mounted with state-of-the art side bin lifters that were acquired at a cost of over N$20 million.These trucks have proven to be technically impractical over a longer period and have now been taken out of service. The City has reverted to the old trucks that are still in operation today. In addition to this issue, there were also allegations of administrative and recruitment irregularities at the division on top of corruption allegations following the outsourcing of the cleaning services to 16 small and medium contractors. A Napwu petition submitted to the council last year cited a number of alleged irregularities at the division, including N$1,7 million allegedly spent on repairing a minor dent on a waste-removal truck. The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) investigated the matter in 2009 but the graft buster was allegedly duped to believe that the money was spent to acquire a brand-new truck that insiders allege was never delivered.The Napwu dossier further revealed that the SWM’s budget for the outsourced Ward Contractor System has constantly been inflated, with figures ranging from N$3 million to N$10 million annually between 2006 and 2010. The cost of the outsourced cleaning services, of which the tenders for the first five years were awarded to 16 contractors in 2006, will allegedly cost the City of Windhoek over N$100 million by the end of October this year.

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