By Mitchell Brooks, AAT guest author

If one looks at the 2011 Preferential Procurement Policy Framework Act (PPPFA) Regulations, the Regulations provide two ratios to be used in determining a tender award. The two point systems are the 90/10 and the 80/20 ratios. The 90/10 ratio indicates that 90 out of 100 points are to be awarded based on the price of the bidder and 10 out of 100 points are to be awarded based on “special goals”[1]. Since the commencement of the 2011 PPPFA Regulations, special goals have primarily been allotted to BEE status levels.

Turning to the 2017 PPPFA Regulations, in which the above-mentioned ratios have been maintained, regulation 4 provides for pre-qualification criteria for preferential procurement. Interestingly, according to regulation 4(1)(a) of the 2017 Regulations, an organ of state may stipulate a minimum B-BBEE status level for tenderers. Furthermore, regulation 4(2) deems any tender in contravention of pre-qualification criteria unacceptable. In essence, the pool of bidders can be reduced significantly by requiring all bidders to possess as a B-BBEE Contribution level 1 despite primary legislation only allowing B-BBEE to be taken into account at a maximum threshold of 80/20. Therefore, it is hard to understand why the allocation of points to special goals is capped at 20 points whereas there is no maximum level allocated to the minimum pre-qualification criteria. Arguably, pre-qualification criteria in this regard are open to abuse in oligopolistic markets with few suppliers.

If one views this legal framework holistically, it may seem that the points allocation in the PPPFA is capable of being somewhat circumvented. In other words, the importance attached to a tenderer’s B-BBEE status level may be increased immensely if a level 1 or 2 B-BBEE status level is stipulated as a minimum pre-qualification criterion. On the other side of the coin, the significance of price may be undermined, rendering a competitive tendering process ineffective in securing value-for-money. This suggests the 2017 Regulations are misaligned in that the purpose of the 80/20 split is unclear when read with regulation 4.

In an effort to restrain pre-qualification criteria restricting a large pool of bidders, a bidder may ask whether a dominant public entity, for example, a monopolistic entity such as Eskom, would contravene section 8(c) of the Competition Act if the pre-qualification B-BBEE status level is set too high. Does it qualify as an exclusionary act which is likely to affect competition in the particular market? This falls part of a larger looming question, at what point does pre-qualification criteria by dominant parastatals become anticompetitive in terms of the Competition Act and how will Competition Law interact with procurement? Section 217 of the Constitution of South Africa does not provide a clear answer but it does suggest that competition may have an important role to play going forward.

[1] section 2(1)(e) of the Preferential Procurement Policy Framework Act Regulations 2011

[2] Competition Act 89 of 1998