Endumeni municipality working through a tender tangle to procure finance system

Endumeni Municipality is facing two objections to a decision to award a R9.8-million tender to replace the current municipal accounting system used by the municipality.

The municipality has indicated Inzala EMS (Pty) Ltd will replace the current Munsoft system.
Munsoft has also lodged an objection, stating that the bid closing date was extended to October 23, 2023.
“Given the 90-day bid validity period, this extension meant that the period lapsed on January 22, 2024. “There was no allowance in the tender documentation for extending the bid validity period beyond this date, nor does any official have the authority to amend this period arbitrarily.

“The municipality lacks the unilateral authority to extend the bid validity period without a timely and agreed-upon request from all bidders, thus concluding the tender process upon the expiry of this period. Our records – including a letter dated January 23, 2024, to the municipality – highlight the lapse of the bid validity period without an appropriate extension.

“To our knowledge, there has been no response to our letter and no award was made prior to the validity period’s expiry.”
The Endumeni Residents’ Association has lodged an objection to the Tribunal Bid Committee.
“Considering the current bleak state of Endumeni’s finances, it is clear that neither the municipality nor the residents will benefit at this stage with this new proposed system, as the Munsoft system currently in use is working fine according to our knowledge,” said said vice-chairperson Willie Steenberg. This latest tangle comes a year after the municipality faced a lawsuit from CCG Systems, which at one stage was one of the two financial management systems used by the municipality.

CCG Systems took the municipality to court because they hired MunSoft while they were still under CCG’s contract.

Although the municipality’s contract with CCG expired in September 2022, the municipality chose to extend it on a month-to-month basis. The municipality received a court interdict on March 24, 2023, restraining the municipality from using MunSoft.
Cllr Salim Adbool explained that CCG was not compatible with the municipal system hence the decision to reuse MunSoft. However, he denied that the Council had awarded the tender to Inzala EMS (Pty).
“No money has been handed over. The document is clear that it is just an intention to award. We have asked KZN treasury to give us guidance here as we cannot have our municipal finance system in disarray. We are committed to that. We are sure that this will be sorted out very soon.”