Experts task FG on effective procurement policy as NASS set to pass 2021 budget

Experts in the field of Purchasing and Supply Management of Nigeria, on Monday, called on Federal and State Governments to put in place effective and efficient procurement policies, with the view to ensure full implementation of the 2021 Appropriation which is expected to be passed on Thursday.

National President of Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply Management of Nigeria (CIPSN), Ado Jibrin, gave the charge in Abuja, during a media chat at the sideline of the 2020 mandatory proficiency development programme, with the theme: ‘Aligning the strategic public procurement and supply chain management practice with good corporate governance towards the attainment of the next level agenda of government’.

He said: “If this country is actually going to develop well, there must be changes with regards to procurement policy, because anything that you will do, as we emphasize; if you look at our budget, a greater part of the budget is on procurement. And when you don’t have an effective procurement policy that will guide for efficient procurement, that’s the end of the budget; the budget will crash.

“So, there must be efficient policies and to achieve this there must be professionalism. Every profession must be given its right to do what it suppose to do. But where somebody is hijacking somebody’s profession, there will be clashes, there can never be perfection,” he warned.

He assured that the Institute has so far trained thousands of professionals in the area of procurement that are endowed with requisite knowledge and experience to ensure effective implementation of the budget and infrastructural projects in line with global best practice.

“That is why we have a problem and crises. Look at the COVID-19, had it been there were good plans, some specific items should be on the ground even before COVID-19, so when it came we were stranded, no equipment, no facilities, unfortunately, no sufficient equipment,” Jibrin noted.

On his part, CIPSN Registrar, Mohammed Aliyu, who underscored the urgent need for a paradigm shift in the procurement system, called for the establishment of the office of the Procurement General of the Federation.

“According to the World Bank study, in conjunction with the Institute in 1999, towards 2000 it was discovered that 80 to 90 per cent of the total budget of any nation goes into contract and services, what other thing do we need?

“What are we talking about is infrastructure in every sector is material, it’s because that segment has been disconnected ever since. They don’t want people to know, that is why it is like that. It is the material that will help every aspect of the things we are talking about.

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To balance this all, let there be Procurement General since there is Surveyor-General, Accountant General, Auditor General of the Federation and Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation. If those areas can be taken care of, for example, in money sector alone, you have Accountant General, auditor general, see all the big buildings you are seeing they are materials they siphoned, that where they invest taxpayer’s money because if it is in the banks, it will be traded, yet we are not looking at that.

“That is why I am advocating that, to balance things up, let there be procurement general, so that the procurement planning because any plan must be backed by appropriation; which is the budget. We are planning for something, you say you will build hospitals, infrastructure in so, so, so places, and you have budgeted for it, and the material aspect of it is not there, what are we talking about?

“You all saw what happened during the NDDC probe when somebody collapsed, what has caused that? Why are people running away from all these types of things? So if the procurement general is there, he will be able to ask questions,” he noted.

While underscoring the need to improve on the procurement processes in the country, one of the stakeholders, Mrs Alaba Bontoye, who alleged that the current process of procurement in Nigeria is very crude, frowned at the crisis trailing the procurement of palliatives during the during COVID-19 pandemic and EndSARS.

“It was lockdown in a place that it will not get to the people. In our assessor, the hospitals are not working, no material, no good hospital even the doctors and those people they are supposed to work with, common nose-mask was not even provided for them, no hand-glove, nothing to work with because the government is not doing what are suppose to do.

“If they are using the right procurement officers all these things will be in place. Our roads are so bad because they are not using the procurement officers judiciously. Those things that suppose to do they are not in place, the professionals are not in place if the procurement officers are in place, all these things will be done well, Nigeria will get to greater heights,” Bontoye noted.

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Experts task FG on effective procurement policy as NASS set to pass 2021 budget