President Mahama’s local content policy in the oil and gas industry seems to be undermined by shadowy hands to the detriment of the nation’s economic interest in a US$7billion project in the Western Region.
The Chronicle can confirm that officials of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) are livid with attempts by ENI to circumvent a tender process aimed at awarding early works contract at Sanzuri in the Nzema area of the Western Region, as a precursor for the beginning of the US$7billion job in the Oil and Gas sector.
Sources close to the paper have it that a tender was opened for the grounds preparation late last year, which saw six companies placing in their bids. Sources indicate that three out of them were disqualified in the pre-qualification stage of the tendering process.
The three companies which moved unto the next stage were Desimone, WBHO and Bilal. According to the GNPC source, Desimone, which is also an Italian Company, did not meet the technical and financial assessments required as part of the conditions stated in the tendering conditions.
What is very upsetting, according to the source, is that while the other two companies performed far better technically and proved financial capability to do the job, Desimone, which tendered with a bid price of US$26 million for the job, but was technically and financially deficient, has been considered above the two companies with sound technical and financial standing and far lower bids, in terms of project cost of between US$ 16 million and US$20 million.
On Tuesday, February 23, 2016, GNPC rejected Desimone at a meeting held at the Company’s head office on the grounds that Desimone should not have even qualified from the pre-qualification stage of the tendering process.
‘Three of the companies who were rejected at the pre-qualification stage were even far better than Desimone’, a livid source told the Ghanaian Chronicle. The grounds preparation works should have commenced in December 2015, but the seeming intransigence of ENI operating in the shadows of some interest groups and the patriotic stand of GNPC is holding the project.
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