Unra loses billions in flawed contracts - Audit

Auditors from the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets (PPDA) have unearthed glaring irregularities in 55 procurements by the Uganda National Roads Authority (Unra) for two years, leading to loss of billions of shillings.

Dated July 2021, and covering 2018/2019 and 2019/2020 fiscal years, the audit concluded that the road agency’s procurement performance was “unsatisfactory”, with a 59.31 percent weighted average risk rating.

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Calling the report a “draft”, Mr Allan Ssepebwa, the Unra spokesperson, said they had provided a “detailed and adequate” response to the audit queries and the agency expects to interface with PPDA for an “exit” meeting to reconcile pending issues.

“What you have in your possession is a management letter which PPDA issued for Unra to make comments. It’s, therefore, a draft report,” he said, referring to the audit report. 

He added: “We submitted a detailed and adequate response to the same, which I would not wish to divulge since we are yet to reconcile with PPDA in an exit meeting. I wish to nonetheless give you assurances that Unra is up to the task in improving efficiency in procurement processes.” 

Procurement timelines at the roads agency have improved and the processes are robust, according to Mr Ssempebwa, and the human resource is “efficient in document processing and reviews”.

“This has made the process faster, but also improved the quality of procurement-related submissions to ensure value-for-money,” he noted in response to our inquiries. 

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The document whose copy this newspaper has seen is titled procurement and disposal audit report for Financial Year 2019/2020 – Uganda National Roads Authority, and it details the contracted roads, expected and actual engineering works, contract price and type.   

The overall objective of the procurement and disposal audit was to “assess and establish the degree of compliance of Unra’s procurement and disposal system and process” with the provisions of the PPDA Act, 2003 and Regulations, 2014.

It further sought to assess the level of procurement performance over the audit period.

Auditors noted that Unra failed to fully implement previous audit recommendations with 100 percent of both the previous compliance and performance recommendations being partially implemented, hence affecting performance.

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Unra’s Director of Procurement, Mr John Omeke, acknowledged the audit findings during an interview with this newspaper last week and noted that they fully answered the queries bullet by bullet.

Proclaiming their openness to scrutiny, Mr Omeke said they have always provided information required by government auditors, including from the Office of the Auditor General.

“We received that report and we addressed all the issues which were raised by the auditors regarding all our procurements and they [PPDA] are yet to write back to us,” Mr Omeke said.

He promised to share their detailed responses, but did not do so over a week, until Unra spokesman Ssempebwa last evening said that they would not make such disclosure.

The government set PPDA in 2003 to act as its “principal regulatory body for public procurement and disposal of public assets in Uganda”, according to information on its website.

It receives and investigates allegations of procurement irregularities, makes decisions including cancellation of tenders and handling appeals, among other mandates.

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Its work over the years has saved monetary losses to government, but accounting officers argue that bureaucratic red tapes and delays in deciding complaints have stalled public works, slowing particularly large-scale infrastructure projects where the stakes are higher and fights by losing contractors bitterest.

According to the audit, Unra failed to provide some procurement records to the audit team for verification in procurements conducted in 2018 worth Shs153b.

Some of the missing records included the contract documents, contract management records, payment records, contract deliverables, contract implementation plan, advertisement of the bid notice, and commencement order among others.

Unra’s Procurement Director Omeke earlier told this newspaper that some of the files had been picked and were already being scrutinised by their internal audit team, explaining why PPDA auditors did not find them on their visit. We couldn’t independently verify this account.

The PPDA auditors reported that Unra officials poorly estimated procurement costs, leading to significant variances between prices in signed contracts and planned or estimated amounts in seven procurements worth Shs573b.

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The audit also shows that there was issuance of inadequate solicitation documents to bidders in nine procurements, worth Shs654b, resulting in Shs583m loss.

Officials also used direct procurement methods without adequate justification as a consequence of negligence on part of the procurement and disposal unit in the procurement of consultancy services for preparation of environmental and social impact assessment of roads in refugee areas involving Shs3b, contrary to procurement regulations, the report notes.

Auditors cited irregularities during the negotiation of bids in three procurements worth Shs11b. As a result, Unra incurred a financial loss of Shs158m out of “negligence”. 

The audit further shows that contract managers failed to effectively manage the contracts in 21 procurements worth Shs967b, leading to a financial loss of Shs436m.

According to the 98-page report, the lack of performance securities implies that the entity isn’t adequately protected against the risk of non-performance by providers.

Additionally, Unra unjustifiably paid an interest of Shs2.2b in advance in three procurements, an amount auditors determined as “financial loss”.

There was also delayed payment to providers in six procurements worth Shs700b leading to a financial loss of Shs2b paid as interest to the affected providers.

According to the audit, there was an increase in project cost due to payments in foreign currency in two procurements worth Shs154b.

This led to a loss of Shs1.6b as a result of payments.
Overall, auditors recommended that Unra should always implement previous audit recommendations to avoid financial losses and delays of procurements, pay contractors on time, cease payment of interest on advance payment with immediate effect, and ensure that evaluation is completed within the stipulated time.

They also tasked the executive director to prevail over heads of user departments to ensure that contract managers carry out their functions in accordance with Regulation 53 of the PPDA (Contracts) Regulations, 2014.