Is public procurement contributing to efficient service delivery?

THE awarding of Kunzvi Dam construction project tender to Chinese company, Nanchang Engineering, was received with mixed feelings by Zimbabweans who felt that the cost had been inflated. The project had been lying idle for more than two decades as boardroom squabbles took a toll on its implementation. Now that government has committed to kickstart the project by awarding the tender, there is light at the end of the tunnel. While there is hope that work will start in earnest, there is fear that corruption, which characterised the awarding of the tender to Nanchang Engineering, might stifle the project. Nanchang Engineering was awarded the tender at a cost of over US$104 million despite the fact that Sino Hydro had submitted a US$60 million bid for the same project.

The case has opened a can of worms and paints the government in bad light as it continues to trample on procurement procedures at an alarming level. This continued flouting of tender regulations and corruption will taint President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s reverie for attaining an upper-middle income economy by 2030 and is a slap in the face of protagonists of the National Development Strategy One.

Government has shown commitment to see the success of its pledges by uplifting people’s lives through development but some goons at the Procurement Regulatory Authority (Praz), a creation of the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets Act (Chapter 22:23), that came into effect on January 1, 2018, are sabotaging the commitment by engaging in corrupt practices. Praz was created to decentralise State procurement, but it is proving to be a breeding ground for corrupt as officials from the organisation have thrown professionalism to the wind. On paper, the creation of Praz was even commended by the World Bank as a benchmark for procurement reforms in Africa meant to bring transparency, fairness, competition, competitiveness, equity, equal treatment, integrity and public confidence in the government procurement process.

This paradigm shift by government ensured Praz took a leading role in building capacity for all State entities as section 6(1)(a) of the new Act empowers Praz to lead the establishment of structures, systems and processes that ensure procurement in the public sector is conducted in a transparent, fair, honest, costeffective, competitive and in compliance with the Act.

Now, the awarding of tenders to non-compliant bidders is heartrending given that this is just a tip of the iceberg which can lead to the exposure of deep-rooted corruption within the regulator and is against the letter and spirit of the Act which emphasises the minimisation of corruption in tender awarding. Section 54 of the Act establishes the Special Procurement Oversight Committee (SPOC) to scrutinise contracts for compliance with the Act as well as the Public Finance Management Act (Chapter 22:19). SPOC is supposed to be manned by members with vast technical expertise and of ethical behaviour as enshrined in paragraph 12 of the First Schedule to the Act.

But, the corrupt awarding of Kunzvi Dam tender to China Nanchang ahead of the deserving Sino Hydro raises stink. The scam has exposed Praz and SPOC secretariat who have shown all and sundry that they are sleeping on duty.

The rot cannot be swept under the carpet as Sino Hydro felt hard done and took the case to the courts to seek recourse. Sino Hydro claimed that China Nanchang was awarded the tender through an illegal call by Zinwa for bidders to pay and submit receipts for statutory SPOC review fees which were mandatory, after the tender had closed. If this action was observed and reported accordingly to SPOC, Nanchang’s bid was supposed to have been disqualified for non-compliance, leading to the cancellation of the tender due to the fact that all bidders had failed to comply with the requirements of the tender.

ZINWA, in view of the provisions of section 33(2)(a) of the Act could have approached Sino Hydro on the basis that they were involved in designing the project with the Public Works Department, and the technical and commercial offer of their bid, for direct procurement premised on the understanding that there was a competitive process where no bids were received. This was a quick and legal solution that would have saved the State US$43 million towards the implementation of this massive national project.

Given the above, there is, therefore, an urgent need to audit the public procurement system to identify the sources of the rot that inevitably affects service delivery to the ordinary citizen. This is against the background that efficient public service delivery is anchored on an effective public procurement system.