Vryheid KZN: Objection delays mall development

Lolo Madonsela

Soon after AbaQulusi Local Municipality (ALM) revealed that a mall development was soon to commence, one of the companies that had bid lodged a complaint over the company that was appointed.
Initially, nine companies contested for the development of the mall, of which only four met all the requirements and had the experience for such a project.
Looking at the disposal of the land where the mall was to be built, ALM had to compare the price offered by each of the four companies to determine the contractor.
According to the information the Vryheid Herald has, the companies offered different amounts to buy the land. The offers were: R7 million, R10 million, R23 million and R27 million. In essence, the municipality opted for the highest offer and that led to the company that offered the least amount lodging a complaint. “It is known that the municipality’s finances have not been looking great. Therefore, when Council asked how the municipality was going to make money, I suggested the disposal of some of our assets that were not earmarked for human settlements. That is how we ended up choosing that land. The motivation behind the disposal of this land in particular was to make money. Hence we had to choose a company that offered us more money than the others. Even though the four companies all met the criteria, they differed in price,” explained Municipal Manager Bonga Ntanzi.

Also read: Mall development may finally see the light of day

Ntanzi indicated that the company that offered the least amount lodged their complaint after 14 days of appointment.
“This company lodged a complaint after 14 days. Their argument was that we did not say explicitly that the price would be the determining factor, which we explained clearly in a meeting with them and their lawyers. We explained that all four of them had met the requirements, therefore we needed one thing that would set them apart, as there was no way we could appoint all four of them.
“When one is disposing of assets, the aim is to make more money. Unlike when you need goods and services – then you want to pay less. They then went to the High Court to lodge their complaint and also went to the Treasury Tribunal. Their matter in court did not stand, because the law clearly states that they need to first take the matter to the Tribunal, then only can they take it further, so they had to withdraw the matter from the High Court.
“The Tribunal heard the matter last week and we are expecting the outcome before the end of this week. We are confident that this matter will now be put to rest so we can continue as planned,” stated Ntanzi.
He confirmed that there was a series of meetings that were already planned, where the appointed company (Green Giraffe) was going to present first to the interim financial committee, which consists of top management and the Administrator. The second meeting is with the Planning & Development Committee, followed by Exco and then Council.
Ntanzi indicated that those meetings were to take place before the dispute was lodged. “Once the Tribunal outcome is out, we will continue where we left off. In those meetings, Green Giraffe is expected to give us information on when are they going to pay the municipality, what would be the first phase of the development of the mall, how many people will be employed, and how many local sub-contractors will they need. We will also look at how we, as the municipality, are going to benefit in terms of rates, electricity and water. We also expect them to give us a date to commence work and the completion date, and obviously we will then sign the agreement.”
The land where the mall will be developed was initially zoned for agriculture, but was later zoned ‘commercial land’. The side of the land, just over the stream near Lakeside houses, more RDP houses will be erected. “The Department of Human Settlements has confirmed a budget for those houses. Those additional houses are prioritised for those people who had their RDPs occupied illegally a few years ago,” Ntanzi added.

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