In 2021, Tanzania halted vehicle inspection at the port of origin after opting to inspect used motor vehicles and spare parts at the port of entry.
Dar es Salaam. A company blacklisted in Kenya has won a lucrative tender to inspect used motor vehicles for Tanzania in Japan, the Tanzania Bureau of Standards (TBS) has announced. The inspection, according to TBS, will be by means of Pre-Shipment Verification of Conformity to Standards (PVoC) as opposed to the current procedure where inspection is conducted after the vehicles arrive in the country. In a statement issued and signed by Public Relations and Marketing manager Gladness Kaseka inspection of used motor vehicles will be carried out by EAA Company Limited in Japan with effect from July 20, this year. Speaking at a news conference TBS’ Said Mkwawa insisted that all due processes were followed and that the best candidate won the contract. In 2021, Tanzania halted vehicle inspection at the port of origin after opting to inspect used motor vehicles and spare parts at the port of entry. Early in April, The Citizen reported that EAA and Auto Terminal Japan had been disbarred by Kenya’s Public Procurement Authority for three years and therefore unfit to bid for the said tender which had been floated by TBS.
Status in Kenya In June 2021, EAA was blacklisted in Kenya for using forged papers to bid for a motor vehicle and spare parts inspection tender floated by the Kenya Bureau of Standards in 2011, 2014 and 2017.
In February 2022, a magistrate’s court in Nairobi dismissed a suit filed by EAA Company Ltd challenging its blacklisting from public procurement in Kenya, as authorities probed allegations that the firm used an unregistered lawyer to lodge the case. In Kenya, impersonation carries a maximum sentence of three years in prison. The ruling, which The Citizen has seen, banned the company for three years from June 21, 2021, and the Kenyan ministry of Finance and Planning published the ban on East Africa Automobiles Services in the Government Gazette on December 24, 2021, stating that it would last for three years.
Procurement laws in Tanzania Despite TBS’s satisfaction with the successful bidder and insistence that the tendering process was free and fair the PPRA regulations state otherwise. The public procurement laws in Tanzania stipulate that if a company is banned and barred from doing business with another nation or with an international company it cannot participate or do business with the government of Tanzania. The law also prohibits companies banned for engaging in fraud or corruption from doing business in the country for 10 years while those banned for any other reason are banned for five years.
