The Public Procurement Authority has affirmed its commitment to ensure that all institutions adhere to procurement laws.
Speaking to Joy Business at the handing over ceremony of the Ghana Institute of Public Procurement and supply (GIPS), Chief Executive Officer of the Public Procurement Authority, Frank Mante, noted that his outfit is organising training programmes for heads of institutions to bring them up to speed about the requirements of the law and the need to ensure proper procurement procedures.
“Building the capacity of actors within the procurement space is one of the authority’s mandates. So we have been organising training sessions for procurements officers, heads of entities, suppliers, contractors, consultants etc. We want to bring them up to speed with the requirements of the law and make sure they understand what they are required to do”.
He further added that certifying procurement professionals is a major step in sanitising the procurement space and further ensuring that procurement officials are guided by a code of conduct just as it is done with lawyers, accountants and other certified professions.
Elaborating on the need to pass the procurement bill, the newly sworn in president of the Ghana Institute of Procurement and Supply, Simon Annan said the bill will ensure that members are certified and capacitated to deal with the procedural and administrative errors which often occurs in the procurement process. This, he, believes will reduce the infractions recorded in the 2021 Auditor General’s Report.
“As an institute, we are working hard to get the procurement bill passed. When the bill is passed, it will help curb some of these infractions. Some of these infractions are not corruption but rather administrative errors. Once the bill comes into motion, the institute will ensure that some of these errors are curbed”, he noted.
On the role of procurement in facilitating trade and local inclusion in Ghana’s industrialization agenda, Head of Department of Management Science at the GIMPA Business School, Prof. Ebenezer Adaku called for a deliberate policy to source raw material from local producers to boost small and medium scale businesses in the country.
“If the African Free Trade Continental Agreement will succeed, If Ghana’s industrialisation agenda will succeed, then professional bodies like GIPS need to ensure that purchasing and sourcing are done from within the continent. If they source from outside of the continent it will hurt Africa and consequently Ghana. As much as possible, we should make sacrifices and try and source from within, it will boost local markets”.
The outgoing president of the institute, Collins Agyemang Sarpong, congratulated the new executives and called on them to train the youth and upcoming procurement professionals on the need to uphold the ethics of the profession.
“It is my hope that the new executives will focus on the youth, on the new graduates. So, we mentor and instill the ethics of the profession in them. This will ensure continuity and improve the procurement space in Ghana”, he said.