Phillimon Mhlanga
A British consulting firm Crown Agency, which won the tender to develop an electronic procurement strategy for the Zimbabwe government last year, has completed the process, Business Times can report.
The latest development was disclosed last week by the Procurement Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (PRAZ) chief executive officer, Nyasha Chizu, who said the e-procurement system strategy would enhance the State procurement process in the country as well as plug loopholes within the system.
Chizu added that the strategy and specifications will be presented to the steering committee of procurement reforms soon. Once that is done, funds for implementation would be availed by the donor community.
Crown Agency advises governments around the world in international trade, procurement, finance and institutional development.
“In terms of our drive towards e-government procurement system, we engaged Crown Agency with the support of the World Bank to develop the strategy for implementation as well as developing specifications of the system,” Chizu said.
“So, as we speak we now have the strategy and specifications. So, the stage at which we are, we just want to present the strategy and specifications to the steering committee of procurement reforms. Once they adopt, then the funds will be made available from our donor community then we will be on the market to procure e-government procurement system,” Chizu added.
Government, early last year, enacted the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets Act, which repealed the Procurement Act and abolished the State Procurement Board (SPB), a body which was conducting procurement on behalf of government entities. PRAZ was set up to replace SPB.
The new procurement law now allows the adoption of e-government procurement system, something which could not be done under the old procurement because law had no provisions for that.
The e-procurement project is expected to address historical loopholes in the current public procurement system and ensure fairness, honesty, cost effectiveness and competition.
It will also bring in efficiency and enhance transparency.
The new system will also result in increased disclosure of procurement data, monitoring and oversight of procurement activities and increased participation.
This will strengthen public financial management, meaning that there will be availability of real time expenditure data and improved service delivery to the citizens. Statistics will also be available to government on how it is spending money and reduce government procurement costs.
Currently most government procurement process is done manually and this resulted in the then SPB controversially awarding multi-million dollar tenders to undeserving bidders.
The system also had many other challenges including delays in procurement, bidder and client complaints and lack of procurement data.
Given that public procurement plays a significant role in the economy, government is moving to promote transparency by taking advantage of the continuous improvements coming from the internet to make procurement for goods and services more efficient through electronic means.
