East African Business Week

KAMPALA, UGANDA- Five consortium companies have submitted their bid documents to construct accommodation and office housing units for the Uganda Police Force.
A consortium is an association of two or more individuals, companies, organizations or governments with an objective of participating in a common activity or pooling their resources for achieving a common goal.
According to Mr. Jim Mugunga the project officer, evaluation of the consortium companies was ongoing last week, and the announcement of the successful bidders is due this week.
"The Police housing project under the public-private partnership arrangement is progressing and right now we are going through the evaluation exercise.
"We issued the Request for Proposal to the prequalified bidders, and the bidders have spent five months preparing responses. We shall evaluate them to decide on the preferred PP partner who will go into negotiations with the government," stressed Mugunga.  
Mugunga noted that the five consortiums, AHADI consortium, ALKRIGHT consortium, ACMIRS consortium, FANGDA (Africa) Developments consortium and EVG3D consortium consist of four companies each. This means that about 20 companies expressed interest.
The Uganda Police Public-Private partnership serviced housing and accommodation project is an initiative intended to deliver suitable and decent office and home accommodation solutions for the Uganda Police Force.
It is a procurement mechanism through which the public sector engages and exploits the private sector competencies to address the deplorable and dilapidated state of accommodation in which police officers work and live.
The project aims at providing accommodation to over 7,200 police families, a modern police headquarter, a regional training academy, regional, divisional and ordinary police stations.
Mugunga explained that the PPP arrangement is a long-term relationship between the developers and the government. He says the companies should have capacity to construct 730 houses using own funds, stay in, maintain and manage these projects.
"Hopefully by the last quarter of the year, this housing unit project will take off. We shall start with the metropolitan divisions like Nsambya, Kira Road, Jinja Road, Naguru, Wandegeya and Kibuli," said Mugunga.
Mugunga indicated that the inspector general of police Kale Kayihura is committed to ensure that the project is a success and has given it the institutional support.
He added that part of the land will be made available for commercial development as a mechanism of generating resources to build much needed institutional housing that include barracks and offices.