MPs are demanding documentary evidence to ascertain that the winner of the multimillion-shilling Treasury tender met all the mandatory qualifications.
The Public Accounts Committee investigating a petition challenging the award of the tender for the provision of on-site support for Ifmis yesterday demanded proof that the winner met all the technical qualifications.
The contested tender was advertised by the Treasury in July 2020 and was awarded to Kingsway Businesses System.
But Transitional Computer Technology Limited, which also bid for the tender last month, petitioned MPs to investigate the award, claiming the winner did not meet a number of "minimum requirements quoted in the tender documents".
TCT was disqualified on the account that its quotation of Sh898,948,256 was higher. The deal was for the provision of on-site support for Ifmis application and enhancement of Ifmis e-procurement.
According to the petitioner, Kingsway Business Systems Limited did not have a minimum of two Oracle Partner Specialisation or Advanced Specialisation for the requested products, which included Oracle EBS Financials, Oracle EBS Supply Chain, Oracle SOA and Oracle Hyperion, which were mandatory requirements.
“When we discovered this illegality, we lodged a complaint to the accounting officer of the procuring entity on August 24, 2020, that complainant was never acted upon,” TCT stated in the petition.
Yesterday, the House committee, during a session chaired by Garissa Township MP Aden Duale, directed Oracle Kenya Technologies Limited to provide documentary evidence of a partnership between itself and Kingsway to enable the committee to properly interrogate the complaints.
Oracle country leader David Bune had told the lawmakers that Kingsway met the qualification as at the tender date. He, however, did not give any evidence.
“The committee wants evidence; we will not take things at face value. We want documentary evidence to properly investigate this matter raised in the petition,” Duale said.
Funyula MP Wilberforce Oundo said that in the absence of evidence, the committee is in the dark and cannot make any meaningful inquiry.
“Without any evidence tabled before the committee, we are like dealing with hearsay because we have nothing to hold on to,” Oundo said.
