Lagos — Secretary to the Government of the Federation, SGF, Boss Mustapha, has urged anti-corruption agencies to deal with conspiracy amongst bidders of contracts and manipulators of procurement processes in the country.
Mustapha disclosed this, yesterday, in Lagos during the 2018 Procurement Officers' Conversion Training for the procurement cadre in parastatals, institutions, commission and agencies of Federal Government.
According to him, "all government agencies must comply with the provisions of the Public Procurement Act and avoid shortcuts that undermine government's anti-corruption posture.
"I urge all government anti-corruption agencies to step up their collaboration to decisively deal with perpetrators of corruption, including collusion amongst bidders, use of fake documents, false claims by contractors and suppliers and manipulation of the procurement process."
Mustapha, who was represented by the Director, Office to the SGF, Mbaeri Nnamdi, stated that the federal government was aware of the calls for the procurement system to hasten the process of delivering critical services and infrastructure to the citizenry, adding, "this will not be at the expense of transparency and accountability.
"At the different levels of government, there is still resistance to reform and Government has continued to receive reports of malpractices in the procurement processes of Government Agencies who have chosen not to follow due processes in conducting their procurement.
"With more officers now getting trained and converted to the procurement cadre, we shall continue to notice significant improvements in our public procurement system through increased competition, transparency, accountability and value for money in the government contracting and procurement process."
Also, the Director General, Bureau of Public Procurement, BPP, Mamman Ahmadu, stated that the training is designed to bring procurement personnel in Ministries, Agencies and Departments, MDAs, to the same page with their counterparts in other parts of the world on the processes, systems, and technologies for managing public procurement
"There is no doubt that public procurement reform has come of age in Nigeria, he said."
