ASELSAN MET ALL REQUIREMENTS

This refers to Conrado R. Banal III’s column (“Turkish daylight,” Business, 5/4/17). The Armed Forces of the Philippines would like to express its appreciation for Banal’s interest in the modernization of the AFP—in this particular case, the procurement of a night fighting system for our soldiers, airmen, sailors and marines.

We are pleased to inform Banal that the specification of “not more than 0.85-millimeter diameter of image intensifier tube” (IIT) set by the Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) is the requirement demanded by our units operating in the field. The specification, therefore, was not made to suit a particular supplier but is based on a measurement exacted by our end-users in the frontline.

There were actually eight companies that participated in the Submission and Opening of Bid Envelopes, but only five were eligible. The others were disqualified following the open bidding competitive procedures, using a nondiscretionary “pass/fail” criterion set forth under the Implementing Rules and Regulations of the Government Procurement Reform Act (Republic Act No. 9184).

Among the five qualified bidders that included US-based manufacturers Nightline Inc. and American Technologies Network Corp., Aselsan Company of Turkey (Aselsan) was determined to have the lowest calculated responsive bid. More importantly, Aselsan met the required “not more than 0.85-millimeter diameter of image intensifier tube.” Hence, the award of the contract to Aselsan.

The fact that Aselsan sourced the equipment from an American company (Harris Corp., which did not participate in the bidding) is solely that of Aselsan. The AFP was after Aselsan’s faithful compliance to the specifications by the BAC.

What concerns us was that Banal, seemingly given inaccurate information, was made to believe that, first, Aselsan cannot obtain certification as to the 0.85-mm diameter of ITT; second, that the BAC waived the certification requirement to cater to Aselsan’s failure; and third, failing to secure a certification from Harris Corp., Aselsan obtained the same from Transvaro which is another Turkish company.

For the record and Banal’s kind appreciation, no certification requirement for Aselsan was waived, and Aselsan was able to obtain a certification from US-based Harris Corp. with regard to the “maximum 0.85-millimeter” diameter. What Transvaro actually did was to assist in the testing, as a third party test is a requirement for post qualification and to validate the certificate from Harris Corp. as submitted by Aselsan.

We are grateful to Banal though for his manifest concern and vigilance over modernization contracts that the AFP goes into. Much as those contracts observe processes that conform to the requirements of the law, we need such display of concern from concerned Filipinos like him. We assure Banal, and the rest of our fellow Filipinos, of the AFP’s unrelenting commitment to transparency and integrity—for the best interest of every Filipino, soldier, airman, sailor and marine.