Architectural designs of some of the Agenda 111 hospitals
Samuel Quartey, President of Ghana Institute of Architects, GIA, has explained why the outfit he leads did not apply for architectural works relative to the Agenda 111 infrastructure project.
According to him, GIA believed there will be no need for new designs because there were existing design models for district hospitals with the Estate Department of the Ministry of Health.
He added that GIA instead presented bids for the post-contract end of the project by forwarding names of their qualified and interested members to the appropriate authorities.
“At that point, our understanding was that, there already existed some designs (already) in the Ministry of Health for this project so we were more interested in the post-contract end of things. So we had sent names of about 26 or so members… (to be) considered for the post-contract end of things.,” he told Evans Mensah on Joy FM’s News Nite programme, September 8.
“We had made an application for the post-contract end of the business, so we had done an internal shortlisting, we had gotten some names of our members and then we forwarded them to an agency that we believe was responsible for this project,” he added.
He reiterated the stance of GIA that the decision to sole-source the drawings for the project, which has been handed to Adjaye Associates, was unfortunate and unfair.
He is quick to add that the practice of sole-sourcing cuts across governments and must end. “Public projects must be procured through some form of public tender not just through sole-sourcing,” he stressed.
Quartey also called for Public Procurement Authority to revisit its rules relative to the procurement of architectural services. His views come at a time a lawmaker Nelson-Rockson Dafeamekpor of the main National Democratic Congress, NDC, has dragged the government to court for sole-sourcing the Agenda 111 drawings to Adjaye Associates.
