War over R2bn contract
PRESSURE continued to mount on Telkom on Friday when the director of a telecommunications company vowed to take the parastatal back to court over tender irregularities.
A director of Maredi Telecoms said he would take action against Telkom because of its failure to block a R2-billion contract awarded to Ericsson last year.
In December, Telkom awarded the R2-billion tender for the installation of a point-to-point microwave system to Telsaf and Ericsson in a 60/40 split.
The remaining two bidders, Maredi and Mobex, were both disqualified by Telkom for failing to meet tender requirements.
After the initial announcement, Maredi chief executive Takashi Utsomiya said Telkom’s tender committee did not give a valid reason for his company’s bid being rejected.
Two weeks ago, Telkom and Maredi Telecoms squared off in the North Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, where Maredi sought to block Telkom from signing an agreement with Telsaf and Ericsson.
The court dismissed that application , with Judge Brian Southwood saying Maredi’s case was weak and it had approached the court with a case based on documents that seemed to have been obtained wrongfully or unlawfully.
He did, however, say in his judgment: “It seems clear that, whether it was faulty test equipment or faulty tender equipment, Ericsson failed the physical test phase and for that reason alone should have been disqualified from the tender.
“It also seems clear that there were improper communication between Ericsson and [Telkom’s former head of network provisioning] Marius Mostert which probably resulted in Ericsson having a second opportunity to demonstrate its equipment.
“This shows bias in favour of Ericsson on the part of Telkom and that this is procedurally unfair vis-a- vis the other short-listed bidders who were not disqualified,” Southwood said.
The Maredi director who spoke to Business Times said he was angry that his company was being pushed aside.
He said: “Our tender prices were better than Ericsson’s, and it’s the public that pays so that Telkom executives can live an extra-luxurious lifestyle.
“We will definitely be making another application to have the tender blocked. We don’t even want damages, we just want to do the work,” he said.
Maredi / Telkom tender battle – give your views
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