19 procurement firms suspended over 'graft'

BabuK · 2014-10-07T15:05:21+00:00

Public Procurement Regulatory Authority board chairman Dr Matern Lumbanga (L) briefs the media in Dar es Salaam yesterday on procurement auditing report for financial year 2013/2014. Following revelation of widespread corruption in public procurement procedures, 19 procuring firms have been blacklisted for at least one year and four others have been barred indefinitely. Releasing procurement audit results yesterday in Dar es Salaam, Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (PPRA) Board Chairman Dr Matern Lumbanga said up to 1.7b/- in dubious payments have been made to contractors by 19 public entities for work that has not been done pointing at perverse corruption in public procurement procedures. He also revealed that 12.03bn/- (equivalent to 19.2 per cent of the entire value of audited projects) that was paid for 52 audited projects was not properly spent. Carried out by PPRA for public procurements made in the financial year ending June, 2014, the audit findings report ‘fruitless and wasteful expenditures.' Dr Lumbanga said appropriate measures must be taken to recover monies paid unjustifiably to the contractors. He named involved public entities and the amount of dubious payment to contractors as follows: Kigoma DC (27m/-), kibondo DC (424m/-), Tarime DC (11m/-), Musoma MC (39m/-), Ukerewe DC (2.7m/-), Maswa DC (57m/-) abd Kishapu DC (117m/-). Others are Mwanza CC (359.7m/-), Kilindi DC (98m/-), Lushoto DC (150m/-) Mkinga DC (33m/-), Bunda DC (38m/-), Butiama DC (29m/-), Rorya DC (18m/-), RAS Lindi (22m/-) Iramba DC (38.8m/-), Singida MC (42m/-) Kondoa DC (62m/-) and Songea (110m/-). He said the auditing also established low levels of compliance to regulations well below the targeted 72 per cent. He said compliance to procurement regulations currently stands at 65 per cent, slightly up from 63 per cent last year. Dr Lumbanga said significant performance gaps in contract management were identified casting serious doubts over quality of service delivery for goods and infrastructures and indicated major losses of public funds. He said the audit shows, with performance percentages in brackets, weak management of performance securities, advance payment securities and insurance covers (47 per cent), negligence of enforcing remedies for delays stipulated in the contracts (61 per cent) and extending contract durations without justification and without following appropriate procedures (43 per cent). Other poor performing areas include, making payment to services providers without following procedures for inspection (38 per cent), delayed payment to service providers (25 per cent) and issuing variations without following procedures (27 per cent). He said other major weaknesses observed include, failure by procuring entities to submit to PPRA tender advertisement and contract awards and to implement procurement information management systems developed by the authority. On the other hand, only 33 projects (valued at 18.5bn/-) out of the 205 audited projects had satisfactory performance while 102 projects had fair performances. The Chairman said the findings are a red alert of corruption in public procurement and that at least thirteen audited entities had fraud symptoms. He said the authority has tasked the prevention and combating of corruption bureau (PCCB) to make quick follow ups and take legal action. "Corruption likelihood was assessed to be higher during the contract management phase, pre-bid phase and evaluation and award phase," he said. The audit involved 4,532 procurement contracts covering works, goods, consultancy services, non- consultancy services and minor value procurements with a total value of 429.5bn/-. SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN

Thread starter BabuK
Start date Oct 7, 2014

BabuK

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19 procurement firms suspended over 'graft'

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