By Martins Oloja
This question has become inevitable because of the inexplicable failure of the presidency to inaugurate the most important institution of governance the Public Procurement Act 2007 Creates for the purpose of protecting public funds by fighting corruption in the public sector. This presidential fear of the Public Procurement Council is now 16 years old. And even the outgoing President Buhari who campaigned with this weapon of fighting corruption in the public sector in 2015 has failed to institutionalise public procurement council eight years on. This is quite disappointing. And that is why it is pertinent to sensitise the incoming presidential bureaucracy that public procurement council should be part of the first deals in the first 100 days in office. It is in public interest.
The Public Procurement Act 2007 establishes the Bureau of Public Procurement as the regulatory authority responsible for the monitoring and oversight of public procurement, harmonising the existing government policies and practices by regulating, setting standards, and developing the legal framework and professional capacity for public procurement in Nigeria.
And more important here, the ‘National Council on Public Procurement’ is the governing body on issues relating to public procurement in Nigeria. It is a high-level organ with approval powers on issues relating to the administration and management of public procurement under the Public Procurement Act of 2007.
On May 13, 2018, here I asked in this column:
‘When will the National Procurement Council be inaugurated? When will the President allow the Federal Executive Council (FEC) to share some powers with the legal Council on Public Procurement generally known as ‘contracts award’ at the federal level?
I had then assured the nation that: ‘Answers to these 11-year-old questions will no longer blow in the wind, as the Council will be inaugurated sooner than later”. I had then explained the rationale for my optimism then this way:
‘This is official, thanks to the wind of change subscription to the strategic “Open Government Partnership” is fast bringing to the way corruption is being fought in the country.
In the first week of May 2018, I was an active participant at the “Open Government Week” in Abuja where a reference to the absence of the Public Procurement Council since 2007 as part of some hindrance to an ‘open government’ led to the confirmation of government readiness to inaugurate the long-neglected Public Procurement Council. In fact, it was confirmed by the Permanent Secretary in Charge of General Services Office (GSO) in the Office of Secretary to the Government of the Federation on Day Four of the 5-day conference.
The Permanent Secretary, General Services Office, (GSO) Mr. Olusegun Adekunle then who represented the SGF, Mr. Boss Mustapha was present at the Monday opening ceremony the Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo declared open.
In response to my observation and a written question by as a participant on when the Procurement Council would indeed be inaugurated since 2007 when the then President Umaru Yar’Adua signed it into law, the Permanent Secretary Adekunle said, “The Council has in fact been constituted and its inauguration will be done very soon”. And spontaneous applause followed the clear answer to an 11-year-old conundrum and anxiety then – for inauguration of the Council.
That was part of the highlights of the Open Government Week 2018, which ended at that weekend (May 10, 2018) in Abuja.
The conclusion of the whole matter then was President Muhammadu Buhari would take the glory of inaugurating the first-ever Public Procurement Council (as provided by law) to deepen public engagement and involvement in procurement processes, being the starting point of corruption in the public sector. He hasn’t till the present.
Specifically, three past presidents have failed to inaugurate the Council.
President Olusegun Obasanjo’s government actually prepared the executive bill on Public Procurement. The National Assembly then passed it but failed to sign it into law. So it was with Fiscal Responsibility Bill, he also failed to sign into law as submitted too by the Clerk National Assembly then in 2007. But Obasanjo didn’t veto the two Bills. He however refused the content of the third legislation, the Freedom of Information Bill. It was a tripartite arrangement to enhance citizens’ access to information and deepen accountability and transparency in public service.
The brass tacks: On June 4, 2007 then President Yar’Adua signed the Public Procurement and Fiscal Responsibility Bills into law. But he failed to inaugurate the Council, which would have removed contracts award from the FEC that has been acting as Tenders Board – till date.
Curiously, despite promises made during the 2015 election, President Muhammadu Buhari too has failed to inaugurate the National Council on Public Procurement, (NCPP) as required by the Public Procurement Act 2007. Instead, the Federal Executive Council, FEC, under the leadership of the president, continues to usurp the most important function of the NCPP: approval of contracts.
The Public Procurement Act provides for the establishment of the NCPP, and the Bureau of Public Procurement, BPP, as the regulatory authorities responsible for the monitoring and oversight of public procurement as well as harmonising existing government policies and practices.
The Act was put in place to allow transparency and ensure public participation in government procurement.
Although President Yar’Adua, who signed the bill into Law, failed to inaugurate the NCPP until his death in office, his successor, Goodluck Jonathan, who stayed in office for six years also failed to inaugurate the Council.
As I had noted here in 2018, that President Jonathan’s spokesperson, Dr. Rueben Abati once asked ‘The Guardian a rhetorical question in a story I did on the thorny issue for the newspaper: “What would you want the FEC to do after inauguration of the Council”, he asked. Which explained why an amendment Bill was sent to the Session of the National Assembly then.
The amendment had sought to remove the power of Tenders approval from the Procurement Council and retain it in FEC. Membership of the Council according to the Act should comprise 12 members to be appointed by the President. While six of the members are government officials, the other six are drawn from relevant professional organisations.
Those from the government side, considered permanent members, include the Minister of Finance, who serves as Chairman, and the Director General of the BPP as Secretary. Others are the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, the Head of Service, and the Economic Adviser to the President. Those representing professional bodies are drawn from the Nigerian Bar Association, the Nigerian Institute of Purchasing and Supply Management, the Nigeria Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Mines and Agriculture, the Nigeria Society of Engineers, a representative of Civil Society Organisations, and the media.
The FEC, the constitution provides as Executive Council of the Federation is made up of the president, the vice president, all the ministers, and some presidential advisers; meaning the president and his political appointees who are all less likely to question his decisions.
The failure of the government to set up the Council means that the FEC continues to approve contracts to be executed by its members. And that is why procurement processes have become a critical part of why the public sector has become a bane rather than a boon to Nigeria since 1999. Obasanjo began the process and so unfortunately, no government after him has embraced the reform of the public sector and that is why the country, the same Obasanjo cleared of debt in 2006 has returned to a debt trap, no thanks to ineptitude and unbridled corruption in the outgoing Buhari administration. If the public procurement and fiscal responsibility nurtured by access to information mechanisms have worked we would have been very close to being the African giant and strong tower of the black race we are destined to be.
It will be recalled that candidate Buhari had in a document circulated during the 2015 campaigns titled ‘My covenant with Nigerians’ promised to “inaugurate the National Council on Procurement as stipulated in the Procurement Act so that the Federal Executive Council, which has been turned to a weekly session of contract bazaar, will concentrate on its principal function of policy making”.
Although after assuming office, the president disowned the document. A fact check later showed that the procurement-policy document was produced by the policy and research directorate of the APC presidential campaign, headed by the then Minister of Solid Minerals Development and former Governor of Ekiti State, Kayode Fayemi, when the party was trying to convince Nigerians to abandon the then ruling party, PDP.
I had on September 16, 2016, written on the same issue here in an article titled: “Where is the Public Procurement Council? (https://guardian.ng/opinion/where-is-nigerias-public-procurement-council/)
Below is an excerpt from the column (article), which addresses the urgency of the public procurement council.
“…But then it is time for the president to overhaul the federal bureaucracy to prevent corruption. And here is the thing, even if the president continues ruthlessly alone as a fundamental objective without involving the civil service of the federation, even by 2019, the result will be that yes, he fought some corrupt people without really fighting corruption. And so the war would have been lost… Therefore, the president should step forward and use an existing law to begin institutionalization of the anti-graft war at the highest level…The Freedom of Information Bill, which was also ready in Obasanjo’s time was not signed into law until May 28, 2011 by the then President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan….”
The whole process would also have been enhanced in the Buhari administration by the Open Government Partnership (OGP) mechanism, a multi-stakeholder initiative focused on improving transparency, accountability, and citizen participation, which also engenders responsiveness to citizens through technology and innovation. The OGP process brings together, government and civil society champions of reforms who recognize that governments are more likely to be more effective and credible when governance is made open to public input and oversight.
The OGP was launched to provide an international platform for national activists committed to making their governments more accountable, and more responsive to citizens in their quest for transparency. At the national level, the OGP introduces a domestic policy mechanism where the Government and civil society can have continuous dialogues on effective transparency policies.
At the international level, the OGP provides a global platform to connect, empower and support domestic reformers committed to transforming governments and societies through openness. It is indeed a multilateral initiative aimed at securing solid commitments from Governments to promote transparency, empower citizens, fight corruption, and harness new technologies to strengthen governance.
In 2011, the OGP was formally launched when the governments of Brazil, the Philippines, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and the United States endorsed the Open Government Declaration and went further to announce their individual country action plans. The success of the OGP process per country, lies in the implementation of the National Action Plan, as it provides an organizing framework for international networking and incentives. In July 2016, Nigeria joined the Open Government Partnership (OGP) as the 70th country.
Nigeria’s joining of the OGP process demonstrates a strong political will to dismantle existing structures, which have assisted the long presence of corruption, including opacity, and ineffective governance caused by a lack of accountability in the country’s institutions.
This is why it is important for the incoming administration to inaugurate the National Council on Procurement (NCPP) as soon as it is sworn it to begin the process of using public institutions to rebuild our broken system that nurtures our underdevelopment.
This article was first published by Guardian Nigeria on 30 April 2023
