The State Registration Service has announced a tender for manufacture and supply of forms of electronic (biometric) passports of citizens of Kyrgyzstan. The state procurement portal says.
The SRS is ready to spend 973,123.5 million soms on the manufacture of forms of the passports. This will be a one-stage procurement method in a two-pack way. Those wishing to supply forms must make a guarantee contribution in the amount of 2 percent of the total cost of the bid.
Supply of electronic passports will be carried out from 2020 to 2023.
At the first stage, the web portal will open the documents of participants confirming qualifications and technical specifications without indication of a price. Evaluation of the bids will be conducted for compliance with qualification and technical requirements. Price offers will be announced at the second stage.
Participants must submit their bids in electronic form by filling out the appropriate forms on the state procurement portal by 5 pm on March 19 this year.
The SRS promised to switch to issue of biometric passports back in 2018. However, the process dragged on and was accompanied by scandals and lawsuits.
U.S. authorities have included Kyrgyzstan, Eritrea, Myanmar, Nigeria, Sudan and Tanzania in the list of countries whose citizens are subject to visa restrictions.
Earlier, the U.S. Ambassador Donald Lu assured of his readiness to provide the necessary assistance in resolving issues related to introduction of biometric passports, and noted that the American side was interested in resolving this issue as soon as possible.
The former chairman of the State Registration Service, Almaz Mambetov, promised that issue of new biometric passports to Kyrgyzstanis would start from January 1, 2021.
