Passport company seeks Colombia to pay US$25 million in conciliation

The company Thomas Greg & Sons presented this Tuesday a conciliation proposal to the Colombian Foreign Ministry for 107.5 billion pesos (more than US$ 25 million) for declaring void the tender opened in May for the issuance of passports and in which this company participated. company.

The company explained that it intends to declare void the resolution with which the public tender for the issuance of passports was declared void and that, in the event that this request is rejected, “is ordered to pay” to the Temporary Union Passports 2023, made up of several companies including Thomas Greg & Sons, “the lost utility”.

This profit, the company added in the request, is equivalent to US$25.3 million.

The company also asked that “The Revolving Fund of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is condemned for the reputational damage suffered by the Temporary Union Passports 2023″.

On October 2, the Foreign Ministry guaranteed the continuation of the issuance of passports, despite the fact that the contract with Thomas Greg & Sons, the company that has been in charge of these documents for the last 17 years, ended that day and stressed that will open a new tender.

“I would like to inform citizens that the delivery of passports will continue normally. For these purposes, the figure of manifest urgency was used. Our compatriots around the world can rest assured“Colombian Foreign Minister Álvaro Leyva said in a statement.

In that sense, the Foreign Ministry appealed to the figure of manifest urgency that allowed the Government to extend the contract of Thomas Greg & Sons for another year, while opening a new tender.

Controversial tender

Last September, the Attorney General’s Office (Public Ministry) opened an investigation against Leyva and the Secretary General of the Foreign Ministry, José Antonio Salazar, for alleged irregularities in the suspension of the tender to issue passports.

The decision to declare the tender void was made after Thomas Greg & Sons was pointed out by other companies that warned that there is no free competition in the award of this contract, which still had three more years left.

“The hiring was being favored for Thomas Greg & Sons to win because basically they were asking for experience and capabilities that only they had.“said Senator Ariel Ávila, from the Alianza Verde party, last month on the program Sin Carreta, on Channel 1.

At the beginning of the bidding, large companies such as the one in charge of official documents for France or Peru presented themselves, but all the companies withdrew, alleging that there were no guarantees to compete for that contract.

Given these suspicions, the Foreign Ministry decided to suspend on September 12 the award hearing in which it was going to define whether the tender was still in the hands of Thomas Greg & Sons or if, on the contrary, it was declared void due to the lack of bidders.