…’non-existent’ company awarded contract
It does not get any extravagant.
The country’s electricity supplier ESCOM has shocked the nation after publishing that it has awarded an over half a billion Kwacha tender award to a company for it to demolish its offices.
A statement published in the local press which Malawi24 has seen has pegged the cost of demolishing the ESCOM house in Blantyre at K675 million and the company that has been awarded the bid is called Irrig Water and Mining Equipment Malawi.
Reports that Malawi24 is yet to verify have indicated that there were other bidders who had far much lower prices but were not contracted by ESCOM. Among the bidders include Shire Construction which pegged the demolition at K120 million. According to social commentator Stanley Kenani, the company that was awarded the contract did not even bid.
An investigation by Malawi24 which was seeking to unearth the people behind the company that has won the tender established that the company has no online presence nor a track record of successfully conducting construction or demolition works in Malawi or anywhere.
The ESCOM building was razed down in a midnight fire in 2013. A report in 2014 ruled out the fire as an accident. However, minister in the Joyce Banda government who also served as the Attorney General Ralph Kasambara claimed that the fire at ESCOM was masterminded by Cashgate convict Oswald Lutepo.
At a salary of K200,000 per month which is the standard for a Secondary School teacher, the money ESCOM is set to pay the company would cater for 3375 teachers in a month.
