THE persistent failure of procuring entities to inform unsuccessful bidders of the outcome, as well as who the successful bidder is, was underscored at Thursday’s procurement symposium, held at the Guyana International Conference Centre (GICC) at Liliendaal.

And, Minister within the Ministry of Finance, Bishop Juan Edghill, addressing the gathering, said, “We want to see it happen and I am making it very clear that procuring entities are called upon to obey the Procurement Act as it relates to notification. It will bring an end to a lot of the grumblings and the dissatisfactions that exist in the society.”
He acknowledged the lapses in following the correct procedures, but maintained that this ought to be rectified.
The prevailing misconception is that such communication ought to be made by the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB), however, several presenters at the symposium debunked this.
The presenters included Mr. John Seeram, Mr. Michael De Jonge, Mr. Fedrick Flatts and Mr. Donald De Clou, who is the Chairman of NPTAB.
Currently, the process that stands is that once a bidder has won a contract for the supply of goods or contracts, NBTAB notifies the procuring entity and it is the responsibility of that entity to notify the other bidders that they were unsuccessful.
If the contract is above $15M, at which level it requires Cabinet’s no-objection, then the no-objection or objection is communicated to NBTAB, which then follows through on the established procedures to notify the procuring entity.
Section 40 (3) of the Procurement Act states that: “Notice of the rejection of all tenders shall be given promptly to all suppliers or contractors that submitted tenders.”

DUE PROCESS

A majority of the presenters stressed the importance of this process to allow the unsuccessful bidders the opportunity to due process.
Once the unsuccessful bidder is notified, that bidder, according to law, has a window of five days to submit a written protest of his rejection.
Section 52 of the Procurement Act states that:
“(1) A bidder whose tender or proposal has been rejected may submit a written protest to the procuring entity.
“(2) The protest may pertain to the pre-qualification or tendering proceedings or to the method of procurement selected by the procuring entity.
“(3) The protest must be submitted within five business days following publication of the contract award decision.”
If the protest is not reviewed by the procuring entity within five business days from the date of the protest’s submission, the bidder may submit a request for review by NPTAB. (Vanessa Narine)