Court has dismissed a case in which road construction firm, Valley Technical Services had sought for orders to overturn decisions of the Uganda National Roads Authority (UNRA) in awarding a number of road upgrade contracts in March 2018.
The High Court in Kampala ruled that the complaint lacked merit since the complaining company committed illegalities in the procurement process.
“…I see no merit in the application. What I see all over this application is a disgruntled competitor for a contract. I am not sure that the court can help such a competitor,” Justice Lydia Mugambe held.
However, Justice Mugambe of the Civil Division ordered that both UNRA and Valley Technical Services shall bear their own legal costs incurred to avoid acrimony.
According to the court decision, UNRA’s senior procurement officer, Lilian Bamulange’s explanations clearly demonstrate that the complaining company committed illegalities and irregularities during the procurement process which automatically disqualified it.
Road construction firm, Valley Technical Services had sued UNRA seeking to overturn the procurement process leading to the award of lots for procurement of mechanised maintenance of selected unpaved national roads for 22 UNRA stations for three years to other bidders other than it who was successful.
The company vainly sought a prohibition order refraining UNRA from awarding, implementing or executing contracts for works arising from the impugned procurement process for lots 4 and 7 with other successful bidders as published in the best evaluated bidders for March 2018, a decision which the complaining firm said it was nullified by the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets Authority (PPDA) which UNRA did not comply with.
Valley Technical Services also unsuccessfully sought for an order prohibiting UNRA from disqualifying it from the bidding process of 2018 for lots 4 and 7 without the publication of the due diligence report as required by the law.
The complaint resulted from the decision of UNRA that displayed the best evaluated bidders as M/s Rodo Construction Limited and M/s Techno Three Uganda Limited and Valley Technical Services as unsuccessful bidder on ground that it failed due diligence.
While analysing the case, the judge observed that the application had been overtaken by events given the passage of time since it was filed.
“I doubt that the respondent (UNRA) has not already executed the projects in issue with other contractors.”
What they say:
UNRA’s director of Legal Services, Mary Kamuli Kuteesa said in an interview that they defend every suit with a belief that the government is in every way entitled to fair and judicious hearing.
“The contractor failed to pass due diligence, they presented false documents, misrepresented the facts regarding their competence and experience with the intention of misleading the procurement results,” said Kuteesa adding “They consequently sued UNRA with the hope of earning UGX12 Billion, a mistake on their part,” Kuteesa said in an interview.