The sole bid for a recently-floated tender, if approved, will cost the national exchequer Rs340 million extra.
The tender, floated a tender for the procurement of 19 million doses of measles vaccine, received just one bid of Rs39.50 per dose, while Unicef offers the same vaccine at Rs21 per dose. However, under the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (PPRA) rules, the Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI) is required to invite open tenders for procurement of vaccines.
Between 2007 and 2010, the government has had to pay Rs4 billion extra. The PPRA board thus wrote a letter to the Prime Minister asking him to exempt the procurement of EPI vaccines from PPRA ordinance 2002 and PPRA rules 2004. The decision was made in a board meeting headed by Finance Secretary Dr Waqar Masood Khan last Tuesday.
Dr Khan confirmed to The Express Tribune that the recommendations were sent to the federal government on the request of Interprovincial Coordination (IPC) Ministry.
The letter from the IPC Ministry to the PPRA board asking them to convene an emergency meeting, a copy of which is also available with The Express Tribune, pointed out to the board that from 2007 to 2010, the national exchequer suffered losses of Rs4 billion as a result of switching EPI from Unicef-assisted procurement to independent procurement through open tendering.
The letter also reveals that in the last four years, the EPI conducted 26 successful bidding exercises, but only eight of those tenders received multiple bids, with the other 18 going to the lone bidder.
The letter adds that there are only 15 World Health Organisation (WHO) prequalified vaccines producers in the world, none of which is Pakistani.
Finance Secretary Dr Khan told The Express Tribune that the exemption was recommended in accordance with the law.
He said there is only one supplier of measles vaccine in Pakistan, and even that party is not a producer, but an agent of the Serum Institute of India. As the only supplier, they enjoy an absolute monopoly and charges inflated rates whenever tenders are floated.
The PPRA board comprises Finance Secretary Dr Khan, Industries & Production Secretary Aziz Ahmed Bilour, Defence Production Division Secretary General (retd) Shahid Iqbal, Water and Power Secretary Imtiaz Kazi, Housing and Works Secretary Kamran Lashari, Communications Secretary Anwar Ahmad Khan, Zahid Hamid Adamjee, Haroun Rashid, Nasir Ali Shah Bukhari, and the PPRA managing director.
Published in The Express Tribune, January 29th, 2012.
COMMENTS
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ