The Sunday News
Vusumuzi Dube, Online News Editor
THE Bulawayo City Council has been accused of prejudicing small businesses after it referred some aspiring businesses to its lawyers for the processing of leases for tenders that were flighted by the local authority last October.
The tenders were for the lease and purchase of various facilities in the city and they saw thousands of Bulawayo residents submitting their bid documents at the closing date.
At the closing time, council corporate communications manager Mrs Nesisa Mpofu said the local authority had sold 2 024 tender forms of which 1 611 were filled and dropped at council offices.
BCC began the adjudication and awarding process for the tenders in January, a process which has seen four of the properties not being processed as they have pending court challenges, while 21 have to be re-advertised as they had no takers.
Bulawayo City Council
However, some prospective leasees have raised concern over the local authority’s move to outsource lease preparations to its lawyers who are reportedly demanding US$900 processing fees, a move which potential leasees say was disempowering them at a time they were also hoping to take advantage of the empowerment projects.
“We were surprised when we got to council, after being informed that we had won the tender, only to be referred to council lawyers for the lease preparation process.
When we got to the lawyers, they told us that for them to process the lease agreements they required US$900, we questioned what this charge was for as this only entailed them printing out the document and us signing, without any negotiations at all.
“We tried to engage BCC officials at the town planning department and they all said that they could not assist us as this was council procedure.
What boggles the mind is that the site we won required a monthly rental of US$150, so now we are paying US$900 just to print out a lease agreement, something is not alright here,” said one of the prospective leasees who declined to be named fearing victimisation.
Responding to these concerns, BCC corporate communications manager, Mrs Mpofu said it was only commercial bays, hospitals, pre-schools and bottle stores that had processing of agreements being outsourced.
“There are indeed some agreements that are done inhouse while others are outsourced. All the leases advertised have their lease agreements signed inhouse.
As for purchases, the agreements of sale are either outsourced or done inhouse depending on the nature of the stands. Service industry bays which include uses such as grinding mills, hair salon, book shops, phone repairs are done inhouse while the rest – commercial bays, hospitals, pre-schools and bottle stores – are outsourced,” said Mrs Mpofu.
In giving an update on the progress, Mrs Mpofu said the local authority had completed the bulk of the tenders for projects, serve for the ones that were being held up due to litigation processes.
“A total of 2024 tender forms were sold and 1611 of these were returned while a balance of 413 tender forms were not returned. The adjudication of the tenders was split into five batches.
The adjudication of batches one to four has been completed and it comprises of 144 lots. Batch five comprises of four lots of stands which have pending high court challenge cases and is yet to be adjudicated,” said Mrs Mpofu.
The other three pending projects are town houses in Selborne Park while 21 sites had no takers and have to be re-advertised. In terms of figures, she said council received 493 bids for commercial stands, 179 for town houses, 161 for Thorngrove leased stands, 156 for leased shops, 127 for service industry bays (leased), 125 for sports clubs, 119 for local authority site, 116 for service industry site (purchase) and 97 for tuckshops.
The local authority also received 80 bids for caravan sites, 77 for factory shells, 76 for fresh farm produce wholesale markets, 73 for the fuel filling station, 48 for Ascot Race Course sites, 44 for a hospital/clinic site, 29 for crèches and 24 for light service industry (purchase).
