24 September 2018, Sweetcrude, Lagos — The Nigerian Port Authority, NPA, has fingered companies that lost out in the bid to secure the contract for the dredging of Escravos Bar in Warri, as being responsible for the attacks it is getting over the contract award.
The NPA said, in response to the allegations of fraud against it, that “all processes as enumerated in the Public Procurement Act (PPA), 2004 were followed in the award of this contract”.
The Authority said in a statement: “The first point to make is that the Authority is guided by provisions of the Procurement Act in all its procurement processes and that not in the Warri contract or any other contract for that matter, have we gone against the provisions of the law.
“In addition to that, all procurements by the Authority is subject to the supervision/approval of the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP) and the Authority received the necessary approvals before going ahead with the award of the contract for the dredging Warri Channel”.
The statement continued: “All arithmetic computations so done by the Authority are in line with the PPA which so permits for the procuring entity to do such and consequent documentations of the computations were submitted to BPP for no objection which was obliged.
“The Authority, upon receipt of the petition alleging that Dredging International Nigeria Limited had been convicted by a law court in Switzerland, sought the legal counsel of the Office of the Attorney General of the Federation and requested an investigation of the petition by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
“In addition to this, although Dredging International Nigeria Limited provided us with a sworn affidavit in support of claims that they were different from the company that was so convicted, the Authority engaged a legal practitioner who embarked on an independent investigation of the petition and the claims of the company”.
The company stated that investigation revealed that allegations that Messers Dredging International Services Nigeria Limited had been convicted in a law court in Switzerland for corrupt practices involving some officials of the Nigerian government including the NPA were incorrect.
