The Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP)-led Amajuba district municipality in northern KwaZulu-Natal has been interdicted from awarding the R89-million Goodehoop wastewater and treatment works tender.
This comes after Melokuhle Trading rushed to the Pietermaritzburg High Court to halt the decision to award the tender to SNA Construction at a higher price and without following established tender bidding protocols.
The district municipality is responsible for providing water and sanitation services to the Newcastle, Emadlangeni, and Dannhauser local municipalities.
Objection period shut down
The tender that landed the municipality in court was awarded on July 21. And the period to object was immediately closed for the losing bidders, sparking an outcry. The period to object is normally 14 days.
In the main, Melokuhle Trading argued in court that the process that was followed to award the tender is flawed. Hence, it should be set aside and readvertised under new terms considering the passage of time.
The company further argued that the tender was only opened to a few selected companies. Those few companies have the capacity and the financial muscle to carry out the work. If the municipality decided to override that, it should have timeously informed the selected few companies on its panel.
Furthermore, it argued that before committing the alleged transgression, the municipality awarded the tender to it for R73-million in October 2024.
Commencement letter
However, the municipality then failed to issue a letter to commence the work, although it was ready to do so.
The municipality allegedly did not respond to communications to issue the commencement letter. This was the case until the agreement was cancelled.
The tender was then readvertised, where SNA Construction was announced as the winning bidder. Melokuhle Trading told the court that “it was bizarre, if not nefarious”.
Melokuhle Trading further told the court that it tried to bid for the re-advertised tender. However, the company was refused bid documents. And it was told that the tender is restricted to only a few companies with 8-CE graded contractors.
“This was of considerable concern, given that the applicant [Melokuhle Trading] was registered on the panel and had previously been awarded the same project,” Melokuhle said in the court papers.
The court has since ruled that the award to SNA is of no effect. And the municipality confirmed in a letter to Melokuhle’s legal team that the appointment of SNA will not be effected until the investigation into the matter is completed.
