The Johannesburg High Court has agreed to hear a case involving several Gauteng security companies challenging the Ekurhuleni metropolitan municipality over a disputed R2-billion tender.
The decision comes after months of wrangling, which has given the companies an upper hand, and has set the stage for a high-stakes legal battle.
In a letter which Sunday World has seen, Deputy Judge President Roland Sutherland has referred the matter to case management and assigned Justice Rean Strydom to oversee the proceedings.
“The matter is hereby referred to case management. The Honourable Mr Justice R Strydom has been appointed to case manage the matter further.
“The parties should liaise with the judge, through his clerk, Mr T Fakude, to set the case management in motion,” the letter reads.
Sutherland instructed the security companies, which include Mabotwane Security Services, KNM Security and LL Security CC, and the metropolitan municipality, to provide a status quo report to Strydom. This detailing issues in dispute and those not in dispute – as well as a proposed or agreed upon timetable and any other relevant issues that may need addressing during the case management proceedings.
He said once the case was certified ready for a hearing, parties could request a trial date from the registrar, who will typically grant the next available date.
The case management judge’s role ends when they issue a certificate of readiness.
“If a joint report cannot be composed, each party must submit their own report. It is noted that the file has been created on court online.
“Once the matter is certified ready for hearing, the registrar may be approached for a trial date who can in the ordinary course, grant parties the next available trial date.
“When the matter is ready for hearing, the case management judge will issue a certificate of readiness. The mandate of the case management judge terminates with the issuing of such certificate,” the letter reads.
The legal battle arises following urgent summons issued to the Ekurhuleni metropolitan municipality by the security companies demanding the metro’s urgent appearance in court to explain certain discrepancies.
The security companies have raised concerns about the extraordinarily rapid appointment of new security companies after receiving bids. Additionally, the companies question the feasibility of the municipality evaluating 231 bids and
conducting site inspections within 25 days.
“Although it is not yet certain on which day the BEC (bid evaluation committee) submitted its report to the bid adjudication committee, it was seemingly done within three weeks. Based on an eight-hour working day, it would mean that even without allowing for any
interruption, the members of the BEC had to evaluate more than 15 tenders per day, which translates to 30 minutes per tender,” read the summons.
The companies also expressed doubt on the fairness of the evaluation process, claiming that expected site inspections were not carried out.
The security companies alleged that political pressure played a role in influencing the process, which favoured specific bidders. Additionally, they dispute the quality of security services provided by the winning tenderers.
They claim that the successful companies did not recruit their own security guards but had instead used their security guards – suggesting they may not have had the required security personnel.
“This creates the impression the successful tenderers never had the required security guards to render the security services,” they said.
“The matter remains sub judice save to say that we shall deal with it via the case management process. Kindly further note that there has been no engagement as yet and the two of the companies have withdrawn their participation in the process,” said Ekurhuleni spokesperson Zweli Dlamini.
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