Southern Africa Development Community Secretariat – Procurement and Grants Policy (3) Under the restricted procedure, the first stage of the procedures is the prequalification. During prequalification, the Procuring Entity issues an Invitation for Prequalification, open to all interested economic operators. The Invitation for Prequalification shall indicate the eligibility and qualification criteria to be mandatorily fulfilled by an economic operator in order to be shortlisted for participating in the bidding procedure. The purpose of the prequalification is to draw up a shortlist of applicants based on compliance of the bidders with the evaluation and qualification criteria, before launching the bidding procedure. The selection procedure, where the long list (all applicants responding to the published notice) is reduced to a shortlist, consists in examining the responses to the requirements established in the prequalification documents. (4) An economic operator and its affiliates, shall submit only one application for the same contract on its own or as member of a joint venture/consortium. For this purpose affiliates are defined as: any legal entity (i.e.: the group of companies, firms, associations, etc) where the economic operator or any of the major shareholders in the economic operator owns at least twenty per cent (20%) of the shares or the share capital. For the same purpose, major shareholder shall be defined as: any legal or physical person who owns no less than twenty per cent (20%) of the shares or the share capital of the economic operator. If an economic operator deliberately or inadvertently submits more than one application per contract, it shall be automatically disqualified from any SADC Secretariat procurement processes for a period indicated in the SADC Secretariat’s procurement regulations. A successful prequalification entails that three (3) to six (6) economic operators are shortlisted. Should the minimum number of qualified economic operators not be attained; the prequalification process shall be declared unsuccessful and cancelled. (5) The prequalification process shall be re-launched only after the conditions leading to the failure of the previous prequalification have been identified and corrected. (6) In the second stage of the restricted procedure, the Procuring Entity invites and sends the shortlisted applicants the Invitation to Bid and the Bidding Documents free of charge. (7) In order to ensure fair competition, bids shall be submitted by the same economic operator or consortium shortlisted that has submitted the application form. No change whatsoever in the identity or composition of the bidder shall be permitted unless the Procuring Entity has given its prior approval in writing. A situation where such approval could be given is e.g. where a merger has taken place between a shortlisted applicant/member of a consortium with another company and where the new company is found to meet the eligibility and qualification criteria and does not raise any conflict of interest or unfair competition. Once the bids have been evaluated, the successful bidder is selected by applying the evaluation and award criteria stated in the bidding document. (8) The restricted bidding procedure shall have the following methods for applications: d) International Restricted Bidding: The method shall be applied for the procurement of complex services,. The application of the method shall follow the requirements stated in the paragraph (1) to (6) of this Article. Under this method the pre qualification must be announced internationally. e) Regional Restricted Bidding: The method shall be applied for procurement of services, of services of smaller values (threshold to be set in the procurement regulations). Under this method, the prequalification must be announced regionally (SADC countries). f) Local Restricted Bidding: The method shall be applied for procurement of services, of small value (threshold to be set in the procurement regulations). Under this method, the prequalification must be announced locally (in the country were the contract will be implemented). 19