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Gov’t pays BK Int’l $74M more than his bid price – Company bid $278M, but contract signed for $352M
By Mikaila Prince
Despite being the highest bidder for a project awarded last week by the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB), Brian Tiwari’s BK International Incorporated was, nonetheless, awarded a contract to the tune of $352M, some $74M more than its already relative high bid offer.
A copy of the contract awarded by NPTAB last week.
In a previous article, Kaieteur News had highlighted that NPTAB, and by extension the Ministry of Finance, had awarded a contract to construct rip-rap sea defences at Content, Mahaicony in Region Five, following massive floods within the district late last year.
BK International was one of the three companies who bid to secure the contract; the other two companies being MB Construction who bid $235,744,500 and Colin Talbot Contracting Services who submitted a bid of $247,599,600, while the engineer’s estimate was $184,521,000. BK’s bid was $278,876,300 – some $31M over the next highest bid and more than $90M over the engineer’s estimate.
Notably, procurement laws stipulate that when it comes to large scale contracts like the one BK was granted, the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board is recommended to choose the lowest bidder. Despite being the highest bidder for the contract, with a significant margin between what BK International bid and what was asked for by the engineer, the company was still awarded the contract. This decision in itself raises concerns, taking into consideration that Cabinet is needed to approve these multi-million dollar contracts and that constitutional body fell with the dissolution of Parliament in December of last year.
Even with the unusual decision by NPTAB to award to the highest bidder, the award letter for this contract shows BK being granted the contract at a price of $352,121,250.
Upon noticing the significance variance with what was asked for by the company and what was awarded to them by the government, Kaieteur News reached out to the Deputy Chairman of NPTAB, Mark Bender. In an email that was dispatched to Bender yesterday afternoon, Kaieteur News requested an explanation for the inconsistencies with the costs. However, up to press time, there was no response.
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