MPs probe purchase of military carriers

Tuesday, 19 April 2011 00:02 BY ISAAC ONGIRI

INVESTIGATION: Military carriers during a parade at at Uhuru Park, Nairobi, on a national day.

A PARLIAMENTARY committee is probing the conduct of purchase of 67 armoured personnel carriers worth Sh1.6 billion from a South African firm.
The committee has just returned from South Africa where it had gone to investigate complaints that the trucks were substandard and were manufactured using secondhand parts.
The Parliamentary Committee on Defence and Foreign Relations which is led by Adan Keynan visited the OTT Technologies in Pretoria where the carriers are manufactured.
Three top military commanders are expected to appear before the committee to answer questions about the tender for the purchase of the carriers.
The military officers may face disciplinary action including a court martial if it is established they violated procurement procedures.
The tender for the supply of the APCs was issued in October last year with deliveries due in September this year. The South African firm beat several other companies such as Mechem Technologies, Paramount Group, Integrated Convoy Protection from South Africa and IAI Ramta from Israel to supply the APCs.
The vehicles are designed to transport infantry to the battlefields and are usually armed with either a machine gun, recoilless rifles, anti-tank guided missiles or mortars. The APCs, which may have wheels or tracks, are not usually designed to take part in a direct-fire battle.
The MPs interviewed several managers at OTT Technologies which has been in operation since 1980 and initially specialised in the refurbishment of ex-stock all terrain vehicles.
The company produces several models of armoured vehicles including the M22TL APC which carries a total crew of up to 14 personnel including the driver. The M22TL can also be used as a command and control vehicle and ambulance.
Keynan and the four MPs who accompanied him—Omondi Anyanga (Nyatike), Otieno Ogindo (Rangwe) and Benedict Gunda (Bahari)—spent a week in Johannesburg before travelling to Pretoria where the company has its headquarters. Their main concern was to get answers following complaints that the use of inferior and used parts in the assembly of the Kenya-bound APCs.
A letter dated April 11 written by the South African firm to the Keynan committee indicated that OTT Technologies has filed a complaint with Tata Motors over the matter. “We have also already talked to Tata regarding the condition of some of the rubber parts and have been assured by them that these parts were erroneously used after their shelf life had expired,” says the letter by S.J Boosyen a director of OTT Technologies.
He defended the firm saying that some parts of the assembled trucks looked old because they were manufactured in India then shipped to South Africa where they were assembled.“Thereafter the Tata trucks were driven 600kms from Durban to Johannesburg which is standard practice for most truck manufacturers in South Africa, and the trucks were driven another 100km from Johannesburg to Pretoria and the last few kilometres were on a dirt road,” Boosyen says in his letter.
The MPs were told the government representatives were also taken to Johannesburg where the Tata trucks are assembled.
Boosyen attributed the complaints to business rivalry especially from the firms that failed to get the tender.