Judul : Nepal-IDEMIA Talks Near Deal as Passport Crisis Intensifies
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Nepal-IDEMIA Talks Near Deal as Passport Crisis Intensifies
Kathmandu, November 13 -- Talks between the Passport Department (DoP) and IDEMIA, the French company that has supplied passports to Nepal since 2010 until earlier this year, are nearing completion for the procurement of temporary passports. This follows a decline in existing stock, with the new contract for biometric passports, awarded to German firms Veridos and Muehlbauer, set to begin in mid-March next year.
The DoP has also not concluded discussions with Veridos, which, together with IDEMIA, is being considered to provide traditional machine-readable passports (MRP) to address the gap until the new biometric passports arrive.
Following the intervention of Prime Minister Sushila Karki, who also manages the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the ministry and the DoP initiated discussions with both current and new suppliers to guarantee a temporary supply from December through March.
At present, the inventory of standard passports held by the DoP is under 170,000. Because of this, the department has significantly lowered the number of applications it processes. Previously, it received 6,000 applications each day, but this has now been reduced to 1,000.
In the last 15 days, Prime Minister Karki met individually with German ambassador Udo Volz and IDEMIA's Group CEO Antoine Grenier, as reported by the prime minister's aides, in an effort to obtain passports.
"We are at the last phase of the agreement," stated Tirtha Aryal, the director general of DoP. "We still need to decide on the source from which we can handle the passports." He mentioned that talks with both German and French vendors are ongoing, but no conclusion has been reached yet.
Authorities acknowledge that obtaining temporary passports from IDEMIA, the previous provider, would be straightforward, as there would be no requirement for technical changes. However, as requested, Veridos has confirmed its commitment to supplying MRPs, which would necessitate a technical shift from the existing e-passports (biometric).
"Our top focus is to obtain more passports from IDEMIA since we don't require any technical changes for just a few months," stated Aryal.
Veridos has proposed to issue passports at a cost of $8.5 each. Representatives from the ministry of foreign affairs and the DoP mentioned that 300,000 passports would be required to address the temporary need, which could be fulfilled by either IDEMIA or Veridos.
However, because of disagreements regarding price and quantity, the DoP had paused discussions with IDEMIA, according to an official from the Prime Minister's Office. During meetings between the prime minister and IDEMIA's CEO Grenier, there was a preliminary agreement to purchase one million passports via a variation order.
During the meeting, Grenier mentioned that the two German companies might not be able to fulfill the March deadline for delivering the initial batch of passports to Nepal according to the agreement.
"Since German companies will not be able to deliver the passports until September, you need an alternative plan," he said to the prime minister, as reported by the official. "To meet the demand until March, you should purchase 600,000 passports as a temporary solution and another 600,000 as a backup through September," the official, citing Grenier, stated to the Post.
Senior officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the DoP, however, raised concerns about Grenier's suggestion, stating that as German companies will start delivering in March according to the agreement, there is no necessity to purchase more than 500,000 passports.
At the meeting, the CEO of IDEMIA expressed worries regarding unjust treatment in the latest passport procurement agreement, stating that multiple procurement laws and clauses were breached when the contract was given to German companies. As a gesture of goodwill, the CEO of IDEMIA declared that his company would supply an extra 60,000 passports to Nepal at no cost.
"We are hopeful that discussions between the foreign ministry, DoP, and IDEMIA will be finalized by Thursday," stated Ajaya Bhadra Khanal, the prime minister's chief advisor.
If the agreement collapses, discussions with the German company will restart, as reported by officials.
In response to IDEMIA's claims of unjust treatment, the government has pledged to examine the tender submissions from every company that took part in the passport procurement process, which concluded in August.
The DoP awarded the contract for implementing the eMRTDS system, covering pre-enrollment, enrollment, data management, and delivery system (package I) to Muehlbauer ID Service GmbH at the bid amount of Rs1,550,814,325.81, which is equivalent to $11,154,834.41, along with an additional Rs738,536.20 as the significantly responsive lowest evaluated bid.
The second agreement, for the production of eMRTDS booklets involving personalization, quality assurance, and packaging (package II), was given to Veridos at a bid value of Rs6,113,827,370.14, which is equivalent to 41,029,978.53 euros, along with an additional Rs161,608,384.79 as adjusted and revised, representing the significantly responsive lowest evaluated offer.
As a result, IDEMIA's 15-year reign as the provider of passports in Nepal concluded.
The CEO of IDEMIA, during a meeting with the prime minister, argued his position by stating that his company has offered passports at the lowest prices to numerous countries and is willing to supply them to Nepal at the same previous rate, provided that Nepal purchases a minimum of 1.2 million copies to cover immediate and emergency needs until September.
"The agreement is currently stalled as officials from the foreign ministry are unwilling to purchase more than half a million passports, a request that IDEMIA has turned down," stated the official from the Prime Minister's Office.
However, the prime minister is open to purchasing a million passports via a variation order, provided that IDEIMA issues the passports at the previous cost of $10.31 each, covering pre-enrolment, enrolment, data management, and delivery.
"We don't require one million passports. IDEMIA needs to recognize our constraints," Aryal said to the Post, adding that purchasing more than necessary could lead to disputes. The Office of Auditor General has been highlighting the matter of passport procurement via the variation order.
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