Last week the parliamentary budget committee visited one of the bidders for the sh336.8b contract to supply nine million radios to school going children.
Government has decided, because of the uncertainity surrounding Covid-19 and when schools will resume normal operations, to procure radios so children can keep up with their classes at home.
School children have been out of school since the end of March. Candidate classes returned to school last month. Government has not said when the other children will return to class.
Under the plan government will source five million sets locally and four million will be imported in equal lots in December and January.
It was reported that the visiting parliamentary committee found that Orion Transformers & Electronics did not have the capacity to produce the radios locally, and that the sample radios they had used to bid for the tender were imported from China.
"The usual suspects jumped on the story as an indicator that Orion was not fit for the job....
It is at times like this that one doesn’t know whether to cry or laugh.
To begin with there are 15 bidders for the contract, so it is curious why the parliamentary committee visited Orion.
Especially since the bid has not been awarded yet.
It is true that government has applied for a sh336.8b supplementary allocation to finance the deal so the MPs are within their rights to scrutinise the deal. It is already bad enough that the MPs are inserting themselves in the process, be that as it is, wouldn’t the prudent thing then be to visit all 15 bidding companies and then come out with a report? Why single out one company?
"I know the ways of parliament are not the ways of us mere mortals, but one has got to wonder what this is about....
To simplify, imagine your local district has called for bids to supply maize flour to the local schools. You hand in your bid along with 14 other bidders, but before the bid has been awarded the district council comes to inspect your mill and whether you meet the requirements. Note that they are not part of the procurement process. Secondly they are visiting only your mill. What are you supposed to think of that? Especially after that casual inspection they announce to the press you are not competent to fulfill the contract.
According to reports the contract stipulates that the radios are supposed to be delivered within 60 – 90 days of the contracts signing. The locally procured radios are supposed to be procured at just over sh37,000 a unit.
But who are Orion Transformers & Electronics anyway?
A cursory look over the net will show that Orion Transformers & Electronics has been in operation in Uganda for eight years. It has been supplying transformers and maintaining electrical installations for such companies as Uganda Electricity Distribution Company (UEDCL), Umeme, Electromaxx Ug Ltd and Kalangala Infrastructure Services.
As to their capacity to build the required radios the company has issued a statement in which they have said they have the capacity in place to produce 200,000 radios a day with production lines at Namanve and Nyanama. And this is ahead of further scaling up of their operation if the deal comes through.
Besides, were they in danger of failing to come good on the contract then they will lose the sh3b bid bond they have put in as well a sh30b performance bond they have to provide on execution of the contract.
But that is neither here nor there and immaterial to the argument here.
We need to aim at being a rule and law based country. We can not advertise one set of rules and then run rough shod of them at a whim. That is the easiest way to scare away investors – both local and foreign. Capital is a coward. It will settle for lower returns in a predictable environment than higher returns in a riskier environment. It owes us no favours.
While parliament is supposed to provide oversight of government, there is a time and place to do that and it is not in the middle of a bid process whatever their feelings maybe about a deal.
As stated earlier government has put in a request for additional funding to finance the radio deal.
"It has been reported that the MPs think the deal is flawed in conception and execution, and it is therefore their right to investigate the process, but common sense should suggest that they can not go and start knocking out bidders selectively....By doing this they have appropriated the role of the relevant procurement department contrary to the law, a law they wrote into effect.
Looking from the outside you have to wonder what is going on and hence be at a loss of whether to laugh or cry, at this state of affairs.
