Challenges to the Implementation of the Public Procurement Act, 2003 (Act 663) at State Owned Enterprises (A Case Study Of Ghana Ports And Harbours Authority)
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Date
2015-02-10
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Abstract
The Public Procurement Act of 2003, Act 663 was enacted in 2003 to harmonise public procurement process, secure judicious, economic and efficient use of state resources and ensure that public procurement functions undertaken within the public sector are fair, transparent and non-discriminatory. Public procurement accounts for about 50% to 70% of total government expenditure, represents 14% of Gross Domestic Product and accounts for about 24% of total imports of Ghana. Since the coming into effect of the Act a number of challenges have been affecting its effective implementation. There, also, have been difficulties in the application of the Act in state owned Enterprises some of which seek freedom from the Act because their activities are not funded from the consolidated fund and they compete in private sector environments. The objectives of this study, therefore, are to identify the implementation challenges at the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority (GPHA) (a state owned enterprise) and also identify remedies to address these challenges. Quantitative research approach was employed. Purposive sampling method was used to select respondents who were directly involved in procurement activities at the GPHA to take part in the survey. Structured questionnaires were used to collect the relevant data from the participants. The results of the study show the main implementation challenges include : lengthy procurement process due to the several layers of approving structures, low procurement thresholds for entity tender committee, incorrect interpretation and application of some provisions of the ACT and lowest evaluated mindset in the award of contract. The following recommendations were made to address the challenges: the Act should be revised to reduce the number of approving structures, the thresholds should be revised, ambiguities in some of the sections should be clarified and entity tender committees should be empowered to verify the reasonableness of major rates submitted by bidders.
Description
A Dissertation Submitted to Department Of Building Technology in partial fulfilment of the requirement of the degree (MSc. Procurement Management).