Award of contract of BRT buses: SIDCL going to commit ‘grave’ mistake?

KARACHI: Sindh Infrastructure Development Company Limited (SIDCL) is reportedly planning to award a $30 million contract of BRT buses for Karachi’s Green and Orange lines to the same Chinese company that provided buses for BRT Peshawar.

M/s Xiamen Golden Dragon Bus Co. Ltd, which had no expertise in manufacturing ‘18-meter Hybrid buses’, was awarded a contract of delivering buses for BRT Peshawar.

As a result, four ‘bus fire’ incidents along with 1700 another incidents were reported within a short span of a month since the BRT Peshawar was inaugurated on August 14, 2020.

The sources claimed that M/s Xiamen Golden Dragon Bus Co. Ltd in its report admitted the failure of capacitors that directly led to the violent heat-up and malfunctions. They also admitted that peak current was supposed to be restrained to limit the flow of current from the motor controller change; however, certain electronic components in the motor controller of buses have been damaged by the abnormal current, which caused the incidents.

Commenting the report submitted by M/s Xiamen Golden Dragon Bus Co. Ltd over the bus fire incidents, the sources said that how the company, “which had no expertise in manufacturing 18 meter Hybrid buses’, was awarded a contract of delivering buses for BRT Peshawar that led to such incidents.

Similarly, the buses provided by M/s Zhongtong Bus Holding Co. Ltd for BRT Lahore also developed serious technical faults within a couple of months and since then those buses are off-road, sources said.

Although the investigation on ‘bus fire’ incidents has not finalized yet, the SIDCL has astonishingly accepted the tenders of M/s Xiamen Golden Dragon Bus Co. Ltd & M/s Zhongtong Bus Holding Co. Ltd for the supply of goods and performance of services for BRT of Green and Orange lines and also declared their bids as technically responsive against the evaluation criteria.

Smelling a rat in the contract awarding process, the sources showed their apprehension over the SIDCL decision of opening their financial proposals without verifying the veracity of the documents submitted by these companies.

Replying to a question, sources said that M/s Zhongtong Bus Holding Co. Ltd was the lowest bidder while M/s Xiamen Golden Dragon Bus Co. Ltd was second and M/s Zhengzhou Yutong Bus Co. Ltd and M/s Beigi Foton Motor Co. Ltd were at third and fourth, respectively.

The operation of BRT Peshawar has now resumed after 37 days (October 24, 2020) but the operator had earlier highlighted serious maintenance issues in the buses.

The operator in its report on BRT Peshawar buses complained about the malfunctioning of passenger doors and other issues related to acceleration, air conditioning, boarding bridge, radiator pipes, battery, high voltage, SOC, panels and switches.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020