High Court declines to nullify standard gauge railway supervision tender

A High Court on Monday declined to nullify a tender awarded to a consultancy firm to supervise the construction of the multibillion-shilling standard gauge railway.

Justice George Odunga dismissed the request by Team Engineering SPA to reverse the award of the tender, saying that there was no bias in awarding the tender

The petitioner had asked the court to nullify the decision by the Public Procurement Administrative Review Board to award the tender to TSDI/APEC/EDON, which the petitioner claimed was a sister company to China Roads and Bridges Company, the successful bidders for the railway tender.

The tender to supervise construction of the railway was floated by Kenya Railways Corporation, which invited bidders for consultancy services for the design, review and supervision of the construction of the standard gauge railway from Mombasa to Nairobi.

After receiving nine bids, only three made it through to the final stage of evaluation.

DEAL SEALED

Team Engineering SPA alleged in its court papers that it was informed the deal had already been sealed before the final evaluation was done. This was during a visit to the Kenya Railways head offices.

This prompted the company's representatives to go to the procurement review board, where they were told that their request for a review was time-barred and that the board lacked the requisite jurisdiction to entertain the review because the contract had already been signed.

The decision provoked the proceedings at the high court.

Justice Odunga said that the decision of the board not to entertain the request for review was based on sections of the Act governing them.

“The contract must have been signed in accordance with section 68 of the Act giving a 14 day timeline.”