ESPPRA’S OVER E197M PROCUREMENT AUDITS

MBABANE – The Eswatini Public Procurement Regulatory Agency (ESPPRA) has successfully undertaken procurement audits valued at over E197.2 million.

The audits were undertaken at the Ministry of Economic Planning and Development, Ministry of Public Works and Transport, Eswatini Post and Telecommunications Corporation (EPTC) and Municipal Council of Manzini. 

As part of its oversight responsibility, the agency is mandated to monitor compliance with the Procurement Act of 2011 and procurement performance by public enterprises (PE) in terms of section 10 (c), which provides the need to perform regular audit reviews on PEs procurement activities.

Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Madoda Mngomezulu explained that the aim of the procurement audits was to evaluate how the process was carried out, whether payments and deliverables were made as per contract. He explained that the findings of such audits lead to a conclusion as to whether the PE was procurement compliant or not, in carrying out the said contracts.

In his findings, Mngomezulu noted that some procuring entities, mostly those that do not have procurement officers/specialists or procurement department, have no proper procurement procedures.

Appropriate

He mentioned that there were instances where goods/services were delivered before the supplier was approved by the government tender board, implying that the supplier was pre-determined by the user and the required goods procured without any approval.

To address this challenge, the CEO recommended that public entities should maintain an appropriate internal procurement system and ensure that their internal procurement processes and functions were being implemented accordingly.

“For every public spending incurred, all the basic procurement cycle stages must be observed and well documented,” suggested Mngomezulu.
It was also uncovered by ESPPRA that there were ineligible companies participating in public procurement.

“Suppliers who do not have key requirements for operating, such as labour compliance certificates, Eswatini National Provident Fund (ENPF) compliance certificate, tax clearance, Form J and Form C were given government contracts,” disclosed ESPPRA.

It has been previously been mentioned that government spends nearly E10 billion of public funds in procurement of goods and services, without following the laid down procedure.   ESPPRA made the scathing revelation on how public funds get used by parastatals and central government procures goods and services without adhering to the Public Procurement Act of 2011, especially section 45 which informs processes how a tender should be issued and granted.



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