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BPP to contractors:'only projects above N1billion come to us'
Newsdiaryonline Sun June 19,2011
Authorities at the Bureau of Public
Procurement ,BPP have revealed that a
total of N216, 690,945,
419.56 was saved by the BPP for the Federal Government while
reviewing project proposals from Ministries, Departments and
Agencies (MDAs) in the 2010 appropriation .Also, Engr Emekah
Ezeh, DG of the bureau made
a rare revelation that
only projects costing
more than N1billion are referred to the bureau.He said
this in a bid to debunk insinuations that his bureau delays
projects. All these were contained in a
press release today.
The N216, 690,945,
419.56 figure saved by the bureau
is
the total difference
between the entire project cost as requested by the federal
procuring entities and as eventually certified by the BPP in the
capital allocation of the 2010 Budget, which ran between January
1, 2010 to March 31, 2011.
Director-General of the Bureau, Engr. Emeka Ezeh, who confirmed
the figures said the reviews which led to the reductions are not
necessarily to accuse anyone of corruption or of unduly
inflating contract sums, but a deliberate effort at improving on
the procurement process to enable government get value for money
as enshrined in the enabling law.
“We have been painstaking in the vetting process to make project
proposals better in the interest of transparency and quality”,
he noted, stressing that the calculations came from proposals
from a total of thirty-six entities.
The Director-General continued: “Through the judicious use of
scarce resources, it is expected that infrastructures and
utilities which have been lacking in the nation’s social life
would be provided. The BPP is now happy to report that
substantial progress is being made in ridding the nation of
avoidable excesses in Public Procurement”.
The technocrat reasoned that through the Public Procurement Act,
2007, the bases of participation in quests for Public contract
have been expanded. The consciousness, knowledge and awareness
of the Act have gradually discouraged the earlier prevalent sole
sourcing for competitive bidding in the award of public
contracts, which is why some of those who have lost out have
remained critical of the Act.
“A sense of participation and possible victory from bidding has
been engendered by the Act. This fact which relates with the
participatory tenets of democracy highlights Nigeria as a
country which is moving with the times. The Act has also brought
about a higher level of responsiveness on the part of
contractors and consultants, which raises the stakes for quality
and productivity in the execution of public projects’, he
stated.
According to him, cost of contracts are no longer unreasonably
expensive as they are vetted with due rigor. He denied lingering
allegations that the Bureau delays projects, asking, “What is
the percentage that comes to the Bureau? Do you not know that it
is only projects that are more that N1billion that come to the
Bureau? What percentage of the Budget is that?”
He stated specifically that “out of 952 requests for Due Process
Certificate received, 843 representing about 89% were certified
while only 9 were denied certification. 100 projects are
awaiting further clarifications by MDAs”.
Continuing, he explained that a lot of these projects are still
in the hands of the MDAs, but because cynics are reluctant to
accept the change being introduced, they would continually
remain unconstructively critical.
He concluded: “The Act is a clarion call to probity,
accountability, adherence to methods in the disbursement of a
common wealth and the production of evidence in the application
of the wealth. The Act tells us that it is no longer business as
usual in the use of people’s money; many bidders who hitherto
have lost confidence in public advertisements for contracts,
have lots of success story to tell on the strength of the Act”.
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