Davide eyes rebidding of Capitol’s P250-M heavy equipment purchase

IN HIS second term, Cebu Gov. Hilario Davide III is planning to rebid the P250 million purchase of heavy equipment for the provincial government, which was embroiled in an overpricing controversy late last year.

He said the province really needs to acquire new heavy equipment in order to pursue several construction projects of the Capitol.

“That’s (rebidding) a direction. We are really intent to acquire new heavy equipment. However, (when) we are going to do it, it still depends. I will still have to decide on that as head of the procuring entity,” he said during a press briefing.

In fact, Davide said he already wrote a letter to the Land Bank of the Philippines asking them to give the Capitol an extension on their P200 million loan, which was signed yesterday.

He said the duration for the loan, which was signed in July last year to start the bidding process of the 11 types of heavy equipment, has already lapsed.

“We wrote Landbank asking them to extend kay ni-lapse naman gud ang period within which to avail of that facility because of the issues that came out questioning the bidding. It even reached the PB (Provincial Board),” Davide said.

“We hope that the Landbank and the BSP (Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas) will accede to our request for an extension of the loan,” he added.

Earlier this year, after the PB looked into the bidding of the heavy equipment purchase, they returned the proposal to the executive department after they found out some errors in the bidding documents, and asked the Capitol’s Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) headed by Davide to correct the errors and decide on the matter.

The BAC, however, has yet to decide on the PB recommendation.

The BAC earlier declared ConEquip as the winning bidder with a bid price of P250.6 million for the contract to supply the province with more than 10 units of heavy equipment.

These included boom trucks, crawler tractors, hydraulic excavators, pay loaders, dumptrucks and a forklift.

These are supposed to be used for the province’s road construction and maintenance projects.

In his press briefing, Davide explained that there are several projects that he would like to pursue during his second term including the Cebu Trans-Axial Highway Project, the rehabilitation of the Baex building at Capitol into a 10- to 12-story building and the improvement of the Cebu South Bust Terminal (CSBT) among others.