Donors’ reluctance affects e-bidding implementation

THE government has not been able to implement the e-bidding system in all development projects due to multilateral donors’ reluctance to adopt the existing system for projects they have funded. As the donors’ fund is an important part of the country’s development budget, their reluctance to adopt ebidding system has affected the government’s efforts to go for e-bidding, said government secretaries at an interaction here on Monday. The World Bank (WB) has approved e-bidding only for nationallevel bidding, while the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has “largely” been reluctant to adopt e-bidding for both national and international bidding under the current system, according to the secretaries. The ADB, however, had adopted the e-bidding system in its Sub-regional Transport Enhancement Project. “As a result, we have not been able implement e-bidding in about 35 percent of our projects,” said Tulasi Prasad Situala, secretary at the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport Management. Kishor Thapa, secretary at the Ministry of Urban Development, said e-bidding is taking place only in government- funded projects. As far as bilateral donors are concerned, Situala said they usually select contractors themselves for projects executed under grants, but e-bidding process is used for projects under loans. The donors have been insisting that Nepal should go for e-bidding to avoid collusion, intimidation and cœrcion, but not under the existing e-bidding system. Both the WB and the ADB have cited “security concerns” for their reluctance to use the existing system. A WB source said the existing ebidding system in Nepal dœs not “guarantee basic technical security” for international bidding. “As confidentiality has to be maintained in international bidding, the existing system, which is prone to data compromise, may seriously affect competition during the bidding process,” the source said. In an email response, the ADB said “several different departments are using different systems developed by local IT firms. However, there are some concerns on the security aspects of those systems.” The two donors, however, have expressed commitment to go for ebidding for projects they have financed after the “central portal esubmission system” developed by the Public Procurement Monitoring Office (PPMO) is completed. “Once this is rolled out, ADBassisted projects of the concerned infrastructure departments are expected to be implemented with the adoption of the said e-submission system developed by PPMO,” the ADB said. The PPMO has already installed the system at a few government offices, including its own office and Civil Service Hospital, according to PPMO Secretary Dhan Bahadur Tamang. The PPMO plans to formally launch the system on August 19 coinciding with its anniversary. “We are still seeing if there is any problem in the system. We will close all other existing e-bidding systems after it is proven problem-free,” said Tamang. The ADB has assisted the development of this system. In June 2012, the government had amended the public procurement regulation including a mandatory provision for the use of PPMO’s “central portal e-submission system”. E-bidding was first adopted in WBfinanced projects under the Department of Roads in December 2007. The adoption of the system has reduced collusion among bidders which has created environment of competition during the bidding. “Our study has found that e-bidding has reduced the cost of the government by 20 percent,” said Sitaula.