The process that Petroecuador initiated to hire an external firm to be in charge of auditing the balance sheets of the public company was declared void.
The reason is that none of the four companies invited to participate submitted an offer. This was reported by Petroecuador on Thursday through a statement.
The state oil company explained that the process was planned to be carried out with a reimbursable loan from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), for which an agreement was signed with the Ministry of Energy and Mines, so that Petroecuador uses the resources to contract the auditory.
Four important and renowned auditing companies, classified as ‘big four’, were invited: Price Waterhouse Coopers (PwC), KPMG, Ernst & Young; and Deloitte & Touche.
Initially, companies had to submit their offers by November 10, but by request the deadline was extended by another week to November 18.
Despite the extension, the Ecuadorian oil company did not receive any offer. Therefore, based on the Public Procurement Law, the process will be declared void. A commission prepared a report to support this resolution.
Through the statement, Petroecuador indicates that in order to continue with the contracting process, which constitutes a structural goal established by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for disbursements for the country, the state company will propose to carry out the audit with signatures nationals that would be subject to approval. For this, it will coordinate with the Ministry of Finance. (YO)
Source: Eluniverso
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