CSO Urges NASS To Intensify Corruption Fight

The a civil society organisations (CSO) has called on the national assembly to intensify its fight against corruption in the country

The Chairman House of Representative Committee on Public Procurement, Rt. Hon. Uyime Idem has stated that the only viable way to fight corruption in the system is to applying the relevant laws is to be united in the application of procurement laws and procedures.

The Chairman gave this advice yesterday while directing the management of the Bureau of Public Procurement, BPP to as a matter of urgency and national interest invite the management of the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply Management of Nigeria, CIPSMN to a meeting, to discuss the grey areas hindering the efficient and proper implementation of procurement process in Nigeria.

Presenting the position of the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply Management of Nigeria, CIPSMN, Dr. Abdul Mamman, the Zonal Coordinator, North Central said the intention of the Bill is to amend the CIPSMN Act 2007 which seek to change the word “purchasing” and replace with the word “procurement” to align with current realities in the practice of procurement across the globe.

The Chairman and other members of the Committee as well as other stakeholders in attendance, frowned at the unhealthy developments over the years in the management of procurement process in the country that has been responsible for it’s poor implementation, low capacity and uncontrolled corruption on the part of public officers.

”Other key stakeholders that spoke in favour of the Bill include Strategy Implementation Office for Presidential Executive Order 5, led by its National Coordinator, Engr. Ibiam Oguejiofo, Prof. James Akanmu of the University of Lagos and representative of the National University Commission, NUC. ”

Others from the government and private sector include representatives of the Nigerian Society of Engineers, NSE, Federal Ministry of Finance and a team of professionals from the Institute led by the President and the Registrar.

Leading the voice for five civil society organizations, CSOs in attendance, the National Coordinator of Procurement Observation and Advocacy Initiative, PRADIN, Mohammed Bougei Attah, gave a speech about capacity gaps after the presentation by the representative of the BPP that harped on the function of the Bureau to include training.

Reacting, Attah informed the audience that as against the common practice by the BPP, the law as contained in Section 5 (k) of the PPA 2007 only mandate the Bureau to “organize” training for would-be procurement officers and not to “conduct” training for them and then issue certificates of attendance to qualify them as procurement officers in the ministries, departments and agencies, MDAs of government.
Furthermore, he said due to inappropriate applications of the procurement process by unqualified personnel, corruption has been on the increase instead of reducing.

The Bill which received overwhelming support of participants at the Public Hearing is for “An Act to amend the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply Management of Nigeria Act 2007 to be in tandem with what obtains in the procurement professional practice across the globe and for other Related Matters”, HR 346 of 2024.

Sponsored by the Deputy Minority Leader of the House of Representatives, Hon. Ali Madami passed the second reading on February 28 this year.