Serious doubts have been voiced by the organized construction industry regarding the Border Management Agency’s (BMA) justifications for extending the deadline for bid submissions for a multibillion-rand South African border post redevelopment project.
In June 2022, Home Affairs Minister Aaron Motsoaledi declared that his department would release a public call for proposals “in a few months” for a project to completely renovate and rebuild South Africa’s six busiest border posts at an estimated cost of over R6 billion.He declared in September 2023 that bids on a public-private partnership (PPP) arrangement for the reconstruction of the border posts could be submitted by interested parties.
Bids from interested parties had to be submitted by March 4, 2024.
The deadline for submitting bids to redesign and redevelop the six border posts has been extended until July 4, 2024, according to a report released by the BMA on Monday.stated that these requests were made after prospective bidders scheduled site visits in October and November 2023 to evaluate the infrastructure’s current condition and recognize the difficulty of the task at hand.
It said the extension requests were mainly premised on:
• The complexity and unique nature of the project;
• The time needed for the prospective bidders to raise funds to finance the project under the PPP arrangement; and
• The long holiday period between December 2023 and January 2024, which interrupted the consultative work of the potential bidders about the project.”
This extension of time is primarily intended to provide the private sector with an extra chance to engage in more extensive consultations with one another and submit competitive bids to the government,” the statement read.
