18 Sep 2019
The Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management (PSALM) Corporation will rebid the structures, plant equipment and underlying land of the 650-megawatt Malaya Thermal Power Plant in Pililla, Rizal.
In the public bidding of the Malaya Plant held today, 18 September 2019, only one bidder submitted a bid offer. It will be recalled that at the start of the bidding process in 2018, there were eleven (11) companies that submitted to PSALM their letters of intent to participate in the said bidding and purchased the bidding documents. After the pre-qualification process, there were four (4) bidders declared as qualified to bid, namely: AC Energy Inc., FGEN Reliable Energy Holdings Inc., D.M. Wenceslao & Associates Inc., and DMCI Power Corporation. Only AC Energy Inc. formally submitted a bid prior to the Bid Submission Deadline at 12:00 noon. Since PSALM’s Bidding Procedures provide that there shall be a failure of bidding if only one (1) bid is received, PSALM President and CEO Irene Besido Garcia was constrained to declare the failure of bidding.
Garcia said “PSALM will commence the second round of bidding as soon as possible once the schedule is cleared with the Board. While it is unfortunate that the bidding failed, PSALM remains very much committed to privatize the Malaya Power Plant this year. Failure of the first round of bidding will not deter us from trying again, and again, until we are able to successfully dispose of this asset.”
In a letter of D.M. Wenceslao & Associates Inc., PSALM was informed of its decision to withdraw from the bidding supposedly “due to current market conditions and uncertainty of supply of fuel.” FGEN Reliable Energy Holdings, Inc. and DMCI Power Corporation did not indicate why they did not submit a bid.
The reserve bid price for the Malaya Plant as well as its underlying land was determined by the PSALM Board in an executive meeting held this morning right before the scheduled public bidding. This meeting was observed by the Commission on Audit (COA) representatives.
Early this year, PSALM engaged a third party consultant, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Philippines, by following the required government procurement procedure under R.A. 9184. PwC was tasked by PSALM to conduct a valuation of the Malaya plant, structures and underlying land. The result of PwC’s valuation was among the factors considered by the PSALM Board in setting the reserve bid price.
Strategic Communications and Partnership Division |