Alonso Group appeals the Valenciaport's decision to exclude Intersagunto from the tender for the new multi-purpose terminal in the port of Sagunto

Alonso Group, through its company Intersagunto Terminales, lodged an appeal with the Port Authority of Valencia for the exclusion of its proposal submitted in the public tender for the construction and operation under administrative concession of a multi-purpose public terminal on quay centre 2 of the port of Sagunto.

IST simulation of the new multi-purpose terminal at the port of Sagunto

Alonso Group, through its company Intersagunto Terminales (IST), the multipurpose terminal of the business group located in the port of Sagunto, has submitted an appeal to the Port Authority of Valencia (APV) requesting the annulment of the agreement adopted by the Qualification Committee, which it considers “arbitrary and illegitimate”. In this agreement, Valenciaport has “surprisingly” excluded the proposal submitted by IST to the public tender for the construction and operation of the largest administrative concession of the port of Sagunto for the movement of goods, a multi-purpose public terminal located in the dock centre 2.

The document of Intersagunto Terminales considers that it has been “unduly excluded from the tender” by infringing the principles of equal treatment and non-discrimination, and adds that “it is ostensible the preference given to the bidding joint venture“, which is the only candidate in the tender after the exclusion of IST. The decision of the Port Authority of Valencia, chaired by Aurelio Martínez, leaves IST without the option to compete on equal terms. For this reason, the appeal requests “to go back in the procedure to the moment before the exclusion of IST and to evaluate the bidders according to the terms established in the bidding conditions”.

Intersagunto Terminales, an Alonso Group company whose capital is 100% Valencian, denounces the fact that, by not incorporating its offer into the public tender, the concession would automatically be awarded to the alliance of three companies: Noatum Terminales – a company with exclusively Emirati capital – Inversiones Algeposa and Boluda Lines – a company which, precisely, is a member of the Port Authority of Valencia as part of the port’s Board of Directors.

In this scenario, Intersagunto considers that free competition is being undermined, while at the same time excluding the terminal with a human resources management more in line with the European regulations of the Spanish Mediterranean arc, as well as rejecting the best economic expectations for the APV itself and violating the legality of public tenders in Spain. For these reasons, IST company anticipates that it will go to all Spanish and European administrative and criminal courts in order to paralyse a decision that would leave its bid without even the possibility of competing on equal terms.

“It is incomprehensible that the Valenciaport rejects a more innovative and revenue-generating proposal”, defends IST

Alonso Group‘s company highlights in its appeal “the enormous difference” between the economic offer of IST, a Spanish company, and the one offered by the joint venture made up of Noatum Terminales, Inversiones Algeposa and Boluda Lines.

In this respect, it confirms that IST’s investment volume alone is 70% higher than that of the jointventure. Furthermore, it details that IST’s proposal increases by €19.1 million the fees of the jointventure’s proposal and highlights that IST’s proposed investment for the first five years of the concession is €34.9 million higher than that of the jointventure group.

Alonso Group considers it “incomprehensible” that the Port Authority of Valencia should reject a much higher income than that presented by the other bidder, the UTE of the three aforementioned companies. Similarly, it is striking that Valenciaport is rejecting new facilities with innovative and cutting-edge technological developments presented in the proposal of Intersagunto Terminales. These are new technologies which, at the moment, do not exist in any of the current terminals integrated in the Port Authority of Valencia, and which are not offered by the other bidders either.

“Full consistency between the technical documentation and the traffic in the Financial Plan”

Regarding the Qualification Committee‘s decision to exclude Intersagunto Terminales from the tender “for being technically unacceptable” in accordance with the terms of the tender specifications, where the evaluation criteria are established, IST concludes that “there is a total congruence between the technical documentation and the traffic included in the Financial Plan“, as well as coinciding with those indicated in the written response to IST’s request for clarification to the Qualification Committee. These conclusions are endorsed by an extensive technical report drawn up by an external consultancy firm, which was also submitted together with the appeal. This external technical report, after a thorough analysis of all the tender documentation, eliminates all the objections pointed out by the Valenciaport’s Technical Committee and which the Qualification Committee adopted in order to exclude IST from the tender.

The appeal reaffirms that, contrary to the assessment made by the Qualification Committee, the technical capacity of the terminal can accommodate the traffic projected throughout the concession and “it is not true that it exceeds the maximum capacity of the Terminal established by IST”, as the APV alludes to for its exclusion from the tender. In this sense, it affirms that it seems clear that “in a matter with a high technical component, they wanted to find an excuse to proceed with the exclusion” of IST.

The appeal also points out that “the Administration – Valenciaport – must treat economic operators equally and non-discriminatorily and act in a transparent and proportionate manner”. In this regard, it recalls the need to invoke the provisions of the Public Sector Contracts Act, entitled “Fight against corruption and prevention of conflicts of interest”, which prescribes that “Contracting organs must take appropriate measures to combat fraud, favouritism and corruption“.