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Report: Public agencies denied women, youth Sh16bn tenders
Public Procurement Regulatory Board Chairman Andrew Musangi (right) with Chief of Staff and Head of Public Service Felix Koskei address journalists in Nairobi on February 13.
Public entities denied youth, women and persons living with disabilities (PWDs) procurement tenders worth Sh16 billion contrary to the law, a report has shown.
The Public Procurement Regulatory Authority’s report tabled in Parliament indicates that some public institutions failed to reserve at least 30 percent of their procurement budgets to disadvantaged groups contrary to Section 155 of the Public Procurement Asset and Disposal Act.
“A number of public entities did not reserve at least the required minimum of 30 percent of their procurement spends to the target groups. An additional observation was on low levels of absorption of the amounts reserved for the disadvantaged groups,” reads the report.
“Despite procuring entities reserving procurement budgets for the disadvantaged groups, absorption of the same has been very low across all categories of procuring entities. There is a need to find out the factors that impede them from spending the reserved budgets.”
Some procuring entities have classified some of their procurements as complex and specialised or security based and therefore cannot be reserved for the disadvantaged groups.
Also fingered are entities that failed to disclose their total budgets, hence blocking the authority from determining the amount of money it reserved not only for the disadvantaged groups, but the entire procurement budget.
The report notes that out of 179 procuring entities in both the national and county governments, 71 did not disclose their procurement budget to the authority.
Cumulatively, the 108 entities that disclosed their procurement entities planned to spend Sh148 billion on procurement of goods, works and services.
Of this amount, Sh27 billion was reserved for procurement from the disadvantaged groups representing just 18.86 percent.
“This is equivalent to 11.14 percent less than the required 30 percent reservation and translates to a value of Sh16, 533,881,973 of all disclosed procurements denied to the disadvantaged groups,” states the report.
Companies owned by women scooped the highest number of contracts awarded by public entities at 57 percent, youth got 36 percent while companies owned by PWDs received the lowest number of contracts at 7 percent.
Counties reserved the most procurements at 42 percent with state corporations having the least at 14 percent. Ministries and state departments reserved 31 percent, public universities and colleges 28 percent while constitutional commissions and independent offices reserved 26 percent.
During the year under, the report notes that only eight out of the 20 ministries and state departments that reported disclosed their planned procurement expenditure to the disadvantaged groups. All the eight, however, reserved more than 30 percent as required, except the State Department of Infrastructure which reserved only 27 percent.
State Department for Co-operatives had the highest reservation rate at 64 percent, followed by Fisheries, Agriculture and the Blue Economy at 31 percent.
“The remaining 12 ministries and state departments reported nil reports or did not fully disclose their total planned procurement budget. It was therefore not possible to determine their level of compliance,” reads the report.
Those that submitted nil reports included the Ministry of Petroleum and Mining, State Department of Trade and Enterprise Development, State Department of Interior and Citizen Services and State Department of Basic Education.
Under the commissions and independent offices, 12 entities submitted their reports on the procurement compliance but only seven disclosed their budget reserved for the disadvantaged groups. Five submitted nil reports. Out of the seven, only four spent above 30 per cent, with Salaries and Remuneration Commission being the highest at 41 per cent.
The Office of the Auditor-General (8 percent), Teachers Service Commission (1.6 percent) and Commission on Revenue Allocation (22 percent) all did not comply with the legal requirement
The Judicial Service Commission, Office of the Attorney General, Public Service Commission, Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission and Commission on Administrative Justice filed nil returns.
Some 100 state corporations and semi-autonomous government agencies submitted their reports, but only 63 disclosed their procurement budget reserved for the disadvantaged groups. Of the 63, the cumulative amount reserved for the groups was Sh14 billion, representing 15 percent of their total procurement budget.
