Councillor Subesh Pillay, Member of the Mayoral Committee (MMC) responsible for Public Works and Infrastructure Development said three bids were received, from three consortia trading under the names; Tsela Tshweu Consortium, Katlego Consortium and Mesong Consortium.

The project is expected to be the first Municipal Public Private Partnership under the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA).

"A preliminary examination of the bids revealed that all bidders appear to have assembled teams capable of delivering the proposed new Municipal Headquarters Complex in the context of the broad output specifications approved by Council," said Pillay.

The full list of consortium members will be released upon completion of the evaluation process.

Pillay said the successful bidder would be required to design, construct and maintain the building for a concession period of 27 years (including a two year construction period), after which the building would revert to municipal ownership and should in terms of the City's requirements still have further life span of 5 years.

Intense evaluation of the technical capacity and compliance with the output specifications issued by the City will be undertaken over a period of several weeks culminating in those consortia which pre-qualify receiving formal Request for Proposal (RFP) with the expectation that preferred and reserve bidders will be named early in 2008, followed by a period of negotiations. Early works, under agreement would commence concurrent to these negotiations.

Financial closure of the transaction is expected to be finalised by March 2008; followed by the full construction programme. The first phase of the new building is expected to be complete by the second quarter of 2010 with the final relocation of all departments by 2011.

Pillay also confirmed that a report approved by the Mayoral Committee recently, resolved to transfer the risk and associated costs of the demolition of the existing portion of the Munitoria Building to the successful bidder, which would result in a saving of approximately R6 million for the City.

"It was initially planned that the Munitoria building which currently houses among others the City Planning, Integrated Communication, Marketing and Information Services as well as the Office of the Executive Mayor and City Manager and a number of Mayoral Committee Members would vacate the building by June 2007. However in terms of the revised schedule the relocation has been deferred to 2008.

"The new building will reflect a distinctly African character; with an emphasis on the pre-colonial history of the City, an announcement will be made soon on the appointment of a panel of experts to ensure that this is reflected in the architecture and final site development plan," said Pillay