Firms trade protests over Afghanistan support contract

NCI Inc. and IAP Worldwide have swapped places in a battle for a pair of U.S. Army contracts to support the Afghanistan's military and national police.

NCI took the first contract with the national police worth $27.7 million to support that agency’s network operations center. The company also won the second $36.3 million contract for operations, maintenance and IT support for the country's ministry of defense.

IAP was quick to protest both of those awards in May. They claimed that if the evaluation was done properly, they would have won.

The Army apparently agreed and cancelled the contracts with NCI, then awarded both to IAP.

So now it is NCI's turn to file a pair of protests against both awards and claim the Army was wrong.

Decisions on the protests are expected by Oct. 3. Unless of course, the Army changes its mind again.