Nelson Mandela Bay SMMEs have met various municipal role players to air their frustration regarding the slow progress in incorporating them into various construction projects around the metro.
The meeting with the mayor, city manager and economic development directorate was held at the City Hall on Friday after the small businesses requested an urgent executive committee meeting with the Nelson Mandela Bay Local Business Committee and the heads of all the metro’s directorates.
The committee says SMMEs are being shortchanged when it comes to receiving the agreed-upon 30% portion of municipal-related infrastructure projects.
Nelson Mandela Bay Local Business Committee secretary-general Masixole Mashelele said the small businesses were being abandoned with no benefits despite being promised by the water division that R15m worth of work would benefit nine SMMEs from all wards in the metro.
“The main purpose of this urgent meeting is that we wanted to check with all the directorates how much they have spent in their budgets more specifically [with] the awarded contracts,” he said.
“For example public health had contracts that were penned with 30% and this quietness is too loud and will lead to the disappearance of what is meant for us.”
Mashelele said the small businesses had lost trust in the municipal officials as they seemed geared to have big companies benefit from work in the metro.
At Monday’s council meeting, it was recommended that SK Business Consultants (SKBC) be further probed by a forensic firm after allegations that the company had been scored irregularly during the tender process to meet the minimum requirements.
A six-month service level agreement was signed in February 2020 with SKBC for the provision of socioeconomic consultancy services for the municipality.
The recommendation came after an invoice for R11m and a legal opinion by advocate Shaheed Patel on December 9 called for a forensic investigation into what he believed to be gross financial misconduct.
It was also agreed that the municipality’s disciplinary board look into the matter.
Local Business Committee chair Glen Tsomo said they had called a meeting for all SMMEs on Monday to seek answers from the municipal infrastructure and engineering department about the project. .
He said they had been stopped by the police, but officials had agreed to meet them on Thursday, which was later postponed for Friday.
“There is an alternative plan between the municipality and the committee while the issue of the consultants is still under investigation.
He said they had asked the officials to report back to them by Monday as they had to meet their entire executive structure to either accept or reject the decisions relating to the terms of reference.
“In November when they suspended the services of SKBC, we asked them their plan and who they were replacing it with, but they had no plan,” he said.
“We have told them we are tired of stopping projects, we need solutions.”
Economic development political head Khusta Jack said he and mayor Eugene Johnson had reaffirmed their commitment to supporting emerging businesses in line with the municipal policy that ensured SMMEs benefited from 30% of projects.
“NMBM tabled an alternative solution to allocate work to SMMEs in accordance with procurement regulations, which was discussed and agreed to by both parties,” Jack said.
“We are confident we are finding each other and are on much firmer ground.”
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