NYS offices. [Photo/the-star.co.ke]
A new storm is brewing at the National Youth Service (NYS) over the controversial purchase and delivery of blankets at a cost of Sh185million.
The management has already opened internal investigations aimed at authenticating how the tendering process was done.
Through a memo addressed to the Principal Secretary in the State Department of Public Service and Youth Lillian Omollo, head of supply chain management Stephen Mwenda told the PS 17 companies responded to bids and 16 of them recommended for price analysis.
“Seventeen firms were issued with bid documents. The tenders were issued on January 11, 2017, and closed on January 25, 2017, with all the firms responding.
Out of the 17 bidders invited, only one bidder who failed in the preliminary stage, therefore, 16 bidders were recommended for price analysis. We wish to state that M/S Flagstone Supplies Ltd has never been awarded a contract to supply blankets by or for the NYS,” the memo reads in part. The correspondence is dated November 24, 2017. Mwenda told Omollo the procurement of blankets was done vide a requisition memo Ref: NYS/ PROC/4/6 dated August 2016.
However, the memo has glaring omissions in the value of the contract and the actual firm awarded the lucrative tender. For the last two weeks, Omollo has been chairing fact-finding meetings in her office with top NYS leadership over the matter.
The procurement department and the top leadership at NYS are hardpressed to explain the variations of the contract value from initial Sh75 million to Sh185 million.