Police leaves ministry in the dark over MCAST charges
Matthew Vella
Two of the five bidders for a €1.8 million contract from the Malta College of Arts, Science and Technology are expected to be charged with making false declarations in their tendering bids, but the Ministry of Education said it was not informed of the identity of the companies.
A police investigation into the contract’s award came to its conclusion last Friday, over the controversial re-grading of the bids by an MCAST selection board, which revised the grades it awarded to five tuition centres tendering for the provision of Information and Communications Technology classes to 600 students.
Although one company, Computer Domain Ltd, was initially found to have made the necessary grade, the marks were revised by the board to ensure all five companies could get a slice of the contract.
Police now claim two companies had submitted allegedly incorrect declarations over the accessibility of their tuition centres to persons with a disability, and charges will be pressed against them in court.
But the police have not officially informed the Ministry of Education who the two bidders are.
In their letter to the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Education, the police also pointed out that the investigation found “a certain degree of carelessness” by the selection board, which did not amount to any criminal offence. Again the letter does not specify what this carelessness amounts to.
Last week MaltaToday revealed that three of the five judges revised their grades upwards by as much as 27% to ensure that all five companies get a share of the €1.8 million contract to give ICT lessons to MCAST students.
Over 600 students enrolled with MCAST had to wait for the start of their course because of the controversy concerning the choice of private companies to provide them with classrooms. After the award of the tender, Computer Domain appealed the decision.
Although last week the Ministry of Education rallied behind the police investigation’s conclusion that the selection board had been “only careless”, Computer Domain has lodged a judicial protest against the board’s chairman Juan Borg Manduca, alleging that he lied under oath during a hearing of the Public Contract Appeals Board.
The decision to revise the grades is questionable because only Computer Domain Ltd managed to qualify after gaining more than the required 70 points in the technical assessment made by the panel. The four other bidders failed to make the grade.
Labour MP Evarist Bartolo, who requested the police investigation, said it was shameful that the ministry was protecting the selection board from the irregularities committed in the granting of ICT training contracts.
The Labour MP insisted that nothing changes the fact that the selection board altered the results of its first report and then proceeded to destroy it. “The board then recommended that the contract is granted to companies that did not meet the required criteria.”
Among the minimum requirements listed, was that premises are fully accessible for persons with disabilities. It is not yet certain whether the tuition centres needed official certification from the National Commission for Disabled People, or whether the MCAST selection board merely accepted their initial declarations.
The panel’s initial grading was allegedly refused by the Contracts Department. Subsequently the judges revised their grades again, resulting in all bidding companies receiving the required 70-point pass-mark.
Yesterday the Ministry of Education said the selection board had been nominated by the Department of Contracts. “The Ministry of Education had only one representative on that Board whose award of the marks which were published last week in your paper indicate consistency. Nevertheless, carelessness is never to be condoned and it is unfortunate that it happened in this case. What this carelessness amounts to still has to verified by the ministry,” the ministry said.
The selection board was chaired by Juan Borg Manduca, the director of MCAST’s institute of ICT, and also a director of Malta IT and Training Services Ltd (MITTS), the government’s IT services company. The other adjudicators were Peter Camilleri, a project manager at MCAST; Fabianne Ruggier, who formed part of the Information Society Secretariat at the Ministry for Investments Transport and Communications; and two other project managers, Rossano Cuschieri and Ray Mangion.
Borg Manduca revised his marks upwards by an average of 20.1% over his initial assessment, while Camilleri and Ruggier increased their marks by 17.6% and 27.8% respectively. Cuschieri and Mangion’s upward revisions were of 0.3% and 1.5% respectively – relatively minimal.
Last Wednesday, MaltaToday wrote that one of the bidders in the MCAST contract, Future Focus, did not have a licence from the education ministry for the tuition of IT. While this statement is taken from a PQ answered by Minister Dolores Cristina that lists 19 tuition centres with the licence for the teaching of IT, Future Focus has pointed out that it has “all the necessary licences from the education department to teach ICT.”
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