Engineers question Sh500m survey by Kenya Pipeline Company

NAIROBI: The Kenya Pipeline Company (KPC) plans to spend a cool Sh500 million to survey a security system installed two years ago at a cost of Sh400 million. On September 15, KPC placed adverts in major newspapers asking for “Expression of Interest (EOI) for Provision of Security Consultancy Services.” The tender number is SU/QT/049N/15.

Documents seen by The Standard on Sunday indicate that KPC has budgeted Sh500 million for this exercise although the system to be evaluated was installed in 2012 at for Sh400 million.

Senior engineers at KPC are opposed to the project but unable to stop it so far because they have been overruled by their bosses, eager to see the project kicks off.

“What my colleagues and I have a problem with is spending that amount of money to do work that has already been done, not once, but twice. Secondly, why is the survey costing more than the entire cost of Phase I?” said a senior KPC engineer who requested not to be named for fear of reprisals.

The engineers say they are opposed to the colossal amount budgeted for the exercise yet two other surveys done on the efficacy of the system are gathering dust on KPC shelves.

The first survey was done in September 2012 by Optilan Ltd, the company from the United Kingdom that won the tender for Phase I of the project. The assessment was free of charge.

In addition, in January this year KPC engineers carried out another internal assessment of the system and even came up with a tender document for Phase II of the project.

The report which was handed over to KPC managing director Charles Tanui identified weaknesses in Phase I which were to be addressed in Phase II. Mr Tanui is among state officers suspended from office in March after featuring in an Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) list of shame.

BUDGETTED MILLIONS

Another engineer who requested not to be named said: “It defies logic why KPC has budgeted millions of shillings for two years now to upgrade this system. It is needless and wasteful.”

This is the second year KPC is budgeting millions of shillings to audit the security system. In the 2014/2015 financial year, the company set aside Sh699,720,023 for the project. However, the project failed to kick off last year after the relevant departments became uncooperative and declined to give their blessings.

In August 2014, an internal team was formed to kick-start the project by benchmarking with other international companies. However, key departments in the day-to-day management of the system were not involved and led to friction that spelled doom on the project.

These key departments that use the security system more than the others are Engineering, Operations, Security, Information Communication Technology (ICT), and Human Resource.

Ironically, employees from the Business Development and Administration departments were put in charge of the project when it was attempted again in August last year. The result was bad blood between these departments, the security officers who implemented Phase I of the project and engineers which ultimately caused the project to be put on ice for a year until it was revived again this year.

“Why was the Business Department being put in charge of a project that does not concern them? Secondly, the security department which is the main user of this project had never requested for the exercise and now it was being shoved down their throats,” said one of the engineers. The security system is not a bad idea, explained the engineers, who said they do not oppose the survey by an independent external body. “It is good because it might reveal to us what we might have overlooked. But we oppose the amount that KPC intends to spend for the survey,” said yet another engineer.

The security system covers personnel and pipeline security, access control system, surveillance of KPC installations, premises security, screening and inspection of people and vehicles in to KPC.