Cape Town aiming to weed out extortion on tender lists with proposed control measures

The City is proposing new internal control interventions to reduce the impact of extortion on City projects, including placing any individuals assessed as high risk, who are connected to a specific tenderer, on the City’s “Red List”, and revoking awarded contracts.

In a statement on Thursday, the City said that in continued efforts to ensure it remains a top-performing metro with zero tolerance for corruption, the annual review of the City’s Supply Chain Management Policy proposes additional measures to reduce the risk of extortion impacting City projects.

The proposed Supply Chain Management Policy Amendments are out for public comment until May 10.

“The City is proposing changes to its Supply Chain Management Policy to improve alignment with existing legislation and to further enhance tender process efficiency and transparency.

“Robust internal control interventions are proposed to reduce the impact of extortion on City projects.

“This includes placing any individuals assessed as high risk, who are connected to a specific tenderer, on the City’s Red List; and revoking awarded contracts, including those that are linked via subcontracting to a high risk main tenderer, once reputational risk and harm is exposed,” said mayco member for finance, Siseko Mbandezi.

He added that extortion is a highly organised, lucrative criminal enterprise and the most vulnerable communities are impacted the most as service delivery suffers.

“In general, the City has done much work over the past few years to improve tender and contract management.

“This is evident in the consecutive annual clean audits that the City receives.

“Good governance and sound financial management, especially through supply chain management mechanisms, are key to unlocking economic opportunities and job creation as Cape Town embarks on its R120 billion planned infrastructure investment programme.

“The current policy is stable and legislatively compliant, and a critical driver of the City’s successful procurement demand plan, with a 97% tender completion rate in 2022/23 and 95% of tenders already completed as at March 31,” Mbandezi said.

The Supply Chain Management Policy is reviewed annually in accordance with the Municipal Finance Management Act Supply Chain Management Regulation 3(1)(b).

The proposed amendments to the policy are available to view at City libraries, sub-council offices, and online at www.capetown.gov.za/haveyoursay.

Comments can be submitted via the City’s website: www.capetown.gov.za/haveyoursay, email: Public.Participation@capetown.gov.za or by hand: City of Cape Town, Supply Chain Management, 8th Floor Tower Block, Cape Town Civic Centre (Attention Adam Kariel).

Cape Times