The Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) has reaffirmed its dedication to offering high-quality intervention initiatives that will benefit future generations of Nigerian researchers and students.
The Fund warned that recipients of its interventions would be fully required to adhere to the rules of the public procurement process as stated in Section 20 (1) of the Bureau of Public Procurement Act, 2007, in order to sufficiently accomplish this purpose.
Arc. Sonny Echono, the TETFund’s Executive Secretary, recently issued the directive in Kano, stating that adherence to such protocols is now necessary to ensure that TETFund-sponsored contracts are awarded in a competitive, professional, accountable, transparent, and cost-effective manner.
Echono was addressing at the beginning of a three-day training on public procurement process capacity building for TETFund beneficiary institutions in Kano, the capital city of Kano State.
The head of the TETFund recalled that the Federal Government’s establishment of the Bureau of Public Procurement was intended to promote sanity and prevent fraud in the procurement process. In order for recipient organizations to fully benefit from government interventions, he continued, complete compliance with public bidding and contract awarding procedures must be upheld as sacred.
Echono outlined the justification for the capacity development on the BPP Act in order to address the issues of some accounting officers of higher institutions around the nation who openly disrespect the process.
Although most of them may have broken the rules unknowingly, he pointed out that the Fund nevertheless saw it as vital to cooperate with the BPP office to close the knowledge gap.
“We are happy to be a world class interventionist agency, as encapsulated in the goal and vision of TETFund,” he stated. As a result, the Fund is dedicated to offering high-quality intervention initiatives from which future generations of Nigerians will benefit.”
Therefore, we must make sure that the implementation of intervention initiatives follows best practices.
“By the mandate of TETFund, beneficiary institutions are expected to comply with the process of BPP for the award of contracts. Let me remind you that government developed polices to minimise open abuses of BPP standard rules, processes and procedures in the award and execution of contracts. Institutions are thereby enjoined to comply.
“While TETFund is fully conscious of the enormous task and responsibility of the Bureau, several officers of our tertiary institutions are not conversant with the reforms in the BPP Act. So, such ignorance has hindered smooth delivery and timely completion of TETFund intervention projects in tertiary institutions across the country. Hence, the workshop is to familiarise participants with the BPP.”
Earlier, Mammam Ahmad, the director general of the Bureau for Public Procurement, raised concern about the growing irregularities in the contract awarding and bidding processes in the nation’s tertiary education institutions.
Earlier, Mammam Ahmad, the director general of the Bureau for Public Procurement, raised concern about the growing irregularities in the contract awarding and bidding processes in the nation’s tertiary education institutions.
The DG, BPP specifically disapproved of organizations that avoid open tender bidding for procurement on purpose as well as poor bidder evaluation, which frequently results in the appearance of unqualified bidders who are unable to provide quality projects. He thus issued a warning, saying that the Bureau is prepared to pursue those responsible for the anomalies in order to reverse the negative trend.
The accounting officers of higher institutions were also issued a warning by Ahmad to guarantee prudent resource management and steer clear of unethical procurement procedures that could result in litigation, project abandonment, inefficiency, and inflation. According to him, the BPP Act’s main goals were to increase accountability, transparency, and cost effectiveness while maintaining professionalism and cost effectiveness in the institutions’ initiatives.
“The Bureau is concerned that several tertiary education institutions tent to avoid open tender in bidding for their procurement process. Also, the adoption of weak evaluation often results in unqualified bidders in the biding process eventually emerging winners of the contracts.
“Some tertiary education institutions also engage contractors to procure equipment when these contractors do not process manufacturer authorisation. These are challenges we are going to address in the retreat.
“We are here to build the efficiency of the accounting officers and other critical stakeholders in the procurement value chain. The essence is to equip the officers with vital skills that are necessary to ensure that good procurement practices are entrenched in the institutions.” Ahmed noted.
