(The Malaysian Insider) - PKR is questioning a Business Times report that a George Kent Bhd joint-venture could win a RM960 million contract for the Ampang Light Rail Transit (LRT) extension project, saying the consortium was knocked out in the bidding process.

PKR director of strategy Mohd Rafizi Ramli said today he “can expose that George Kent is not the consortium who was chosen in Prasarana's open tender process” despite the speculation in the business daily's June 22 edition.

“There was a full fledged bid evaluation. It was a very big project and the winner from the exercise bid is not George Kent,” Rafizi told a press conference today.

“This can be confirmed in a letter from Prasarana managing director Datuk Shahril Mokhtar dated December 12, 2011 informing the Finance Ministry that PDA consortium had been picked as the best contractor for the project,” he added.

Referring to the letter which was enclosed to reporters, Rafizi said Shahril had written to the Finance Ministry seeking approval to issue a letter of intent to PDA consortium.

Rafizi said PKR will expose more of the “scandal” every two days from today “that is sure to test Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s commitment in fighting corruption and misappropriation.

“That is how confident we are, that is how much dirt we have,” he said.

Business Times had reported sources with knowledge on the matter as saying the winning bidder for the job was expected to be announced by the government within the next few days.

Eight groups had made a bid for the Ampang line extension systems contract which closed on June 16, 2011.

Business Times first reported that George Kent may win the job in July last year.

Prasarana, a fully-owned government company established by the Finance Ministry, had budgeted RM1.5 billion for the system works.

Prasarana is spending some RM7 billion for the extension of both the Kelana Jaya and Ampang LRT rail networks.

The Ampang network will be extended by 17.7km.