Teodorico José de Menezes, used the casting vote to decide the judgment of the legal action requesting the suspension of the tender process for the refurbishment of the Castelão stadium, which shall be a host venue for the 2014 World Cup, in Fortaleza. Thus, after seeing that there were no irregularities in the Invitation to Bid, the Court cleared the tender to go ahead.
Even so, the tender process is still stopped, waiting for the Courts of the State of Ceará to analyze two internal interlocutory appeals lodged by the state and also by the Arena Multiuso Castelão consortium.
The zig-zags of the judicial battle
In the beginning, the Government of Ceará published the Invitation to Bid No. 20090004 to implement the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) for the refurbishment of the Castelão. Interested in participating, the companies Galvão Engenharia, Serveng-Civilsan Empresas Associadas de Engenharia and BWA Tecnologia e Sistemas em Informática established the Arena Multiuso Castelão consortium, presenting the documents required by the Invitation to Bid.
Then, however, the Consortium was administratively disqualified “for not having the technical capacity to carry out the work”. The Consortium then appealed to the tender commission (Central Commission for Public Tenders) which expanded the concept in the tender from “multiuse arena” to “multiuse equipment”, and can therefore once again apply as a candidate in the tender.
This meant that another competitor, the Novo Castelão Consortium, lodged an injunction with an preliminary request against the alleged illegal act committed by the President of the Commission, and also appealed to the TJ-CE asking for the suspension of the Arena Multiuso Castelão consortium “for technical incompetence”. As a result, the consortium is temporarily suspended from the tender process.
In the next chapter of this saga, the Arena Multiuso Castelão consortium and the Government lodge two interlocutory appeals, requesting that the envelopes of the proponents stay sealed and that the decision shall be judged by the Pleno. The tender process is therefore put on hold, until the decision of the Pleno comes out (no date has been set as yet).
Finally, the race for the PPP heated up even more the following week, when Veja magazine published a news report with denouncements of possible irregularities in the process, including the presentation of dubious technical certificates by some of the competitors.
Tender under suspicion
More suspects of irregularities start to surface, such as a possible mistake in the counting of the points of Marquise, which obtained a maximum score (100). The information suggests that the subcontractor of the Arena Multiuso Castelão consortium did not complete work in other states and would also be the subject of judicial lawsuits. It is also suspected that State Governor Cid Gomes is personally interfering in the choice of the winner. All these problems would have led to the suspension of the tender by provisional measure taken by the Audit Court of the State of Ceará (TJ-CE). Previously, the Federal Courts had already requested the correction of the points allocated to Marquise.
Inquiry Attempt
On Monday (5 July), Parliamentary members of the Legislative Assembly of the State of Ceará gathered 16 signatures for opening a public inquiry (CPI), but this measure was blocked by the bloc allied to State Governor Cid Gomes (Brazilian Socialist Party). Even before the request could be lodged, two congressmen allied to the PSB, Edson Silva and Roberto Cláudio, lodged another two requests for CPIs about Drug Trafficking and Piracy, seeking an impasse, as the regulations of the House only allow two commissions to be in operation at the same time.
highlights
04/05 | News
