A Former President of the Institute of Financial and Economic Journalists (IFEJ), Mr Lloyd Evans, has called on Ghanaian authorities to amend the Public Procurement Act in the country to strike out the restricted, single-sourced and sole-source rendering processes from it.
According to him, those procurement methods, as stipulated in the Act 914 (as amended in.2016), are proving inimical to the country in the fight against corruption.
He made this call at a capacity training workshop on Business Integrity Reporting, organised by the Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII), for Business and Financial Reporters in the country.
Public Procurement Act
The legislation that regulates and governs public procurement in Ghana is the Public Procurement Act 2003 (Act No. 663).
Also, it was later amended in 2016 and now known as the Act 914 (Act 2016).
Furthermore, the promulgation of the Act formed an integral part of Ghana’s Public Financial Management Reforms and good governance initiative.
More importantly, it sought to instill propriety and accountability in public sector financial management and expenditure.
Regulations under the Act
In addition to this, it also regulates “the procurement of goods, works and services financed, in whole or in part, from public funds and the disposal of government stores”.
According to the Act all state agencies, institutions and establishments in which the government has a majority interest are mandated to comply with the Act.
Additionally, the Act makes provision for Competitive tendering, Two-stage tendering, Procedures for two-stage tendering, Restricted tendering, Procedure for restricted tendering,
Other procurement methods stated in the Act are Single-source procurement, Procedure for single-source procurement, Request for quotations, Procedure for request for quotation.
Abuse of the system
However, Mr Evans, described the Act as “a very useless Act, which must to be reviewed”.
Owing to this, Mr Evans is of the opinion that there are many loopholes in the Act, which was making it easy for people to still cheat the procurement system at the expense of the state.
Business Integrity
Meanwhile, the Executive Director of the Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII), Mrs Linda Ofori-Kwafo, explained the main reason for the training workshop.
Credit: GII
She said the business integrity forum was birthed following complaints from international community that businesses in Ghana were suffering due to corruption in the private sector.
Furthermore, she added that, with the help of DANIDA, her outfit held forums in Accra and the other regional capitals where all the issues were brought out for discussion.
“We actually put together all the challenges of business people, we brought it before all the institutions who have the power and the authority to resolve them under the law”, she said.
Also, she added, the private sector is not only trying to find solutions to the problem but what role they could also play to tackle corruption in the private sector.
Again, she added that “they are always crying that we are the victims, we are the victims, but it cannot be wholly true. Private sector cannot be the only victim of private sector corruption. They themselves are perpetrators of the crime”.
