MANILA – Goldilocks Bakeshop Inc. may become the new supplier of cakes of the city government of Makati for its free birthday cakes program for senior citizens.
During the bid on Monday afternoon at the Makati City Hall, Danilo Villas, head of Bids and Award Committee, said the Goldilocks was the lone bidder for birthday cakes. The bidding was considered “closed” since only Goldilocks joined the bidding even as the local government gave ample time to other bidders to participate since July 21. The deadline of submission of bids was scheduled at 1:30 p.m. on Monday.
“We published the announcement in a newspaper and we waited for other bidders to give them equal opportunity but only Goldilocks participated in the bidding,” said Villas.
He said Goldilocks was the only cake supplier that bought the bid documents for Php 10,000 and offered Php 8.7 million for the cakes of 31,187 senior citizens whose birthdays are from August 15 to December 15.
The approved budget for the cake project was Php 9,356,000.
Villas said they will still validate the bid documents of Goldilocks for seven days before they can recommend the awarding of the contract.
The price given by the bakeshop for the each cake measuring 9 inches (round) by 2 inches (height) ranged from Php 266 to Php 285 depending on the three flavors indicated in the project requirements which were choco chiffon, marble chiffon and mocha chiffon.
The search for the new cake supplier came a month after Acting Mayor Kid Pena announced that he would bid out the contract for the supply of birthday cakes for seniors in “an honest and proper process.”
The acting mayor — who assumed office after Mayor Junjun Binay was ordered suspended by the Office of the Ombudsman over allegations that the Makati City Science High School building was overpriced — said that he would continue the cake-giving project but promised that the cakes will be “more affordable, tastier and branded.”
Pena also said that one of the major reasons for the search for new suppliers for the birthday cakes was to avoid controversy since the program came under fire after lawyer Renato Bondal alleged in a Senate hearing last year that the cakes were overpriced.
Last June, the city bid out cakes but was not awarded to Bakeright Inc. since Mayor Jejomar Erwin “Junjun” Binay failed to sign the contract due to the suspension order filed against him by Renato Bondal, who sought Binay’s indictment for plunder along with his father, Vice President Jejomar Binay.
The latest suspension order was in connection with the alleged overpriced Makati Science High School Building.
Bondal, who lost against the younger Binay in the 2013 mayoralty race, said the Php 1.35-billion school building should have cost only about Php 470 million.
He had also claimed the Binay cakes were overpriced at Php 1,000 each instead of Php 306.75 but Binay’s camp repeatedly denied the allegations and dared him to show documents to prove his accusations.