The ban on local governments in the province on initiating any auctioning processes – imposed by the Sindh Local Government Department through a notification in the fiscal year 2009-10 – has been withdrawn with immediate effect.
While issuing guidelines for the disposal of contracts of various taxes/fees/rents of local governments under the Sindh Local Government Ordinance 2001, the provincial department has directed all local governments to initiate the process of awarding contracts by open auction for the next financial year immediately. According to the guidelines, the concerned local governments shall ensure the submission of auction papers to the Sindh Local Government Department for confirmation and formal approval in order to ensure transparency.
Every attempt should be made to lease out the contracts through open auction and in case of failure – even after three attempts – offers shall be received by the local government concerned. Then the offers received shall be examined by the concerned department for consideration and approval. As soon as the contracts/offers are approved by the government, the local government concerned shall enter into an agreement on the lines of a model draft agreement with the contractor and after observing codal formalities, the possession of the contract will be handed over to the contractor without any delays.
Similarly, the contracts have to be leased out by public auction for a period of one year corresponding to the financial year and any deviation from the prescribed rules/instructions would be construed to be a serious irregularity. It is to be noted that auction committees at the union level will comprise District Officer/Administrator as the chairman and Secretary (union administration) as member/secretary. On towns/taluka level, the administrator will be the chairman; whereas, on the level of city/district government, the DCO and EDO (finance and planning) would be the chairmen along with the EDO and DO as the auction committee members.
