The ANC in the Western Cape on Tuesday welcomed a High Court ruling that set aside and ordered the re-evaluation of a R113.5 million tender to rehabilitate sewers in Cape Town.

“One would have expected from the ‘best-run’ Cape Town to have sufficiently adapted its internal workings in order to be able to stand scrutiny,” spokesman Richard Diyantyi said in a statement.

In a judgment handed down last Wednesday, Judge Judith Cloete ordered the city to re-evaluate a bid from JK Structures, the first applicant in the case, for trenchless rehabilitation of sewers.

According to the ANC in the province: “In this case corruptive practice and irregularities rendered the process null and void as the city’s bid evaluation committee did not even follow its own rules”.

Diyantyi said: “The DA should stop preaching to other spheres of government and sweep at its own door”.

JK Structures and Carp Civils took the City to court after their bids for the tender were rejected. The city informed JK Structures that its bid was rejected because it failed to complete a fully priced schedule of rates and failed to attain the minimum score for functionality. However, there was confusion over the non-functionality issue and Cloete proceeded with the non-pricing issue only.

Carp Civils was informed that its tender had been rejected because it had failed to complete a fully priced schedule of rates. The court ordered that the city’s decisions to reject both companies’ tender bids due to a failure to price for all rates items be reviewed and set aside.

Cape Town’s Bid Evaluation Committee was ordered to reconsider both companies’ bids. Carp Civils was granted the chance to explain its failure to price certain items in its bid within 14 days and to inform the city of the prices it would have filled in. SAPA