A.B. Adjei
CHIEF EXECUTIVE Officer (CEO) of the Public Procurement Authority (PPA), A.B. Adjei, has indicated that the New Patriotic Party (NPP) administration never in 2016 promised to end the practice of single sourcing when it was voted into power.
According to him, the party only promised to address the abuses that were associated with single sourcing previously.
He noted that will be impossible for anyone to advocate for single sourcing method of procurement to be expunged from the laws of Ghana.
Mr. Adjei was responding to questions at the Ministry of Information’s Meet the Press series on Tuesday in Accra.
Asked whether the NPP’s government has gotten rid of sole sourcing or single sourcing procurement after raising several complaints about the practice during the erstwhile President John Mahama’s administration, he noted that the concern of NPP at the time was the wanton abuses associated with single sourcing and not that single sourcing itself should be removed from the law.
He noted that it was impossible for any procurement regime around the world to do away with sole sourcing, adding that the NPP promised to control the abuses of single sourcing under the then Mahama’s administration.
In 2017, he said, there were 420 applications for single sourcing of which 236 were approved and 184 rejected.
Restrictive tendering in that year, he said, there were 372 applications, 174 approved and 198.
In 2018, single sourcing applications were 511, with 409 approved and 103 rejected.
In the same year, 386 were made for restricted tendering, with 261 approved and 125 rejected.
Over Ghc 1 billion was saved in 2017 and 2018 through the process.
Making a comparison between the NDC regime and the NPP’s Government, he noted that in 2016, total applications for both single sourcing and restrictive tendering were 1,214 of which 1,184 approved and 30 rejected.
Giving the breakdown, he said, sole sourcing applications were 622 with 236 approved, 134 rejected.
Restrictive tendering for 2016 had 592 applications, with 587 approved and five rejected.
The NDC regime, he said, made no savings in 2016 from single sourcing and restrictive tendering.
BY Melvin Tarlue