I see from the front-page article of March 23rd of Net News that a plan was devised to exclude competitive bidding from the largest building project ever undertaken by the Caymanian Islands Government.
If you only have one company submitting a price, which I have now come to understand has been accepted, in no way can that be construed as “competitive”.
Here again, the whole system of bids being considered by Government is brought into question. Further proof of Government’s way of doing business as usual.
This certainly smacks of the tainted MC Restoration debris clean up and latterly Scrap Removal “bids”.
If you are building a house, you decide on the basic floor plan, layout, size and in conjunction with professionals like Architects, Engineers, Designers and other construction specialists you decide on the quality of the structure, elevations, finishes, etc.
They write the agreed upon specifications on your behalf. Armed with this you solicit a turnkey pricing from qualified contractors to build and finance exactly as specified.
Why wouldn’t all local qualified contractors, sub-contractors in partnership with others not be interested in bidding?
And what’s the hurry anyway. Frankly, with Government left with only one “bid” to consider, should the period for more tenders of this $60 million project be extended?
If the original intent was to hand this contract to a specified pre-selected contractor, then all I can say is that they have succeeded and somewhere and this smells of some fees being made by some people with connections.
Furthermore, this is far more blatant and conniving than the new Royal Watler Port Authority building.
Gerald Moore
