Staff Reporter.
The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) has welcomed a Special Tribunal judgement declaring the R113.2 million Gauteng Department of Health personal protective equipment contract awarded to private company LNG as invalid and unlawful.
The Centurion-based company had scored the tender from the Gauteng department of health at the height of Covid-19 in 2020.
The SIU had applied to the Special Tribunal to have the contract scrapped following an investigation into the affairs of the department.
“On 24 April 2020, the then Chief Financial Officer of Gauteng health department Kabelo Lehloenya took a decision to procure 500 000 N95 masks at R55,50 each, 1 000 000 three-ply surgical masks at R18.00 each and 250,000 boxes of 100 sterile, powder-free surgical gloves at R270 per box.
“An SIU investigation in the affairs of Gauteng health department has found that [a] competitive bidding process was not followed and deviation from this process was not duly approved, and the contracted prices were high.
“Furthermore, the SIU found that LNG was not registered on the government’s Central Supplier Database for the supply of PPE [personal protective equipment] when it was awarded the multimillion-rand contract,” the unit said.
The company was ordered to pay legal costs for the application while the SIU was ordered to file expert report on the reasonableness of the income and expenses set out in LNG statements.
The Special Investigation Unit (SIU) had been tasked to investigate all questionable PPE tenders that were awarded by the state during Covid-19. SIU had brought the application before the Tribunal.
Compiled by Lehlohonolo Lehana.