Prime
Parliament, Water ministry faulted on procurement deals
MPs during plenary recently. PHOTO/ PARLIAMENT
What you need to know:
- Audit reports for both Parliament and Ministry of Water and Environment published in July 2021 show that both entities failed to implement previous procurement recommendations made by PPDA, hence causing financial loss to the government
The Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets (PPDA) has unearthed procurement irregularities made by the Parliamentary Commission and the Ministry of Water and Environment during the Financial Year 2019/2020.
Audit reports for both Parliament and Ministry of Water and Environment published in July 2021 show that both entities failed to implement previous procurement recommendations made by PPDA, hence causing financial loss to the government.
The ministry’s principal communications officer, Mr Charles Muwonge, said he hadn’t read the PPDA report but noted that audits help entities to rectify mistakes that could have been made.
“Usually the purpose of the audit is to highlight issues where improvement is needed and when we receive these reports we implement the recommendations as highlighted by the auditors,” he said.
Asked whether the ministry addressed the issues raised by PPDA, Mr Muwonge said he was unable to verify since he’s currently indisposed and hasn’t returned to office.
Parliament’s director of communication Chris Obore didn’t pick our calls yesterday neither did he reply to our text messages.
According to the audit, the Parliamentary Commission had a low procurement plan implementation rate of 20 percent (Shs57b) with a variance of 80 percent, implying that planned activities worth Shs226b were not executed hence depriving service delivery to the intended beneficiaries.
Auditors also found out that there was low bidder participation in Parliament’s three procurements worth Shs300m.
Auditors noted that lack of competition hinders the entity from enjoying the benefits of receiving competitive bid offers which may ultimately affect the achievement of value for money.
The commission also approved two procurements worth Shs1.6b without conducting evaluation hence there was a risk of awarding contracts to firms without sufficient capacity.
The audit also shows that Parliament underestimated the procurement requirements at the planning stage in the procurement of motor vehicles for the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association conference worth Shs17b.
Auditors warned that inadequate planning affects implementation of other priority procurements as a result of diversion of funds.
Water ministry
According to the audit, there were irregularities in the bidding process in two procurements worth Shs2.4b in the Ministry of Water. The audit states that there was no evidence of issuance of addenda to reflect changes adopted during pre-bid meetings hence the value for money was affected.
The audit further shows that there were irregularities in the evaluation of four procurements worth Shs4.4b.
For instance there was passing a bidder who submitted an invalid tax clearance certificate and passing a bidder who submitted audited books of accounts by a firm that was not registered by the Institute of Certified Public Accountants of Uganda.
“…this causes unfairness during the evaluation process and may lead to contract award to non-compliant bidders,” the auditors wrote.
Recommendations
PPDA recommended that both Parliament and Ministry of Water and Environment should properly manage the bidding processes because such irregularities negatively impact on their reputation and may lead to low bidder participation. The Agency also recommended that evaluation committees should strictly adhere to the criteria outlined in the solicitation documents.
