Tinubu fails to offer important particulars of newly awarded contracts

Final Tuesday, President Bola Tinubu’s aide, Bayo Onanuga, shared 20 initiatives and insurance policies adopted by the Federal Govt Council (FEC) within the conferences held final Monday and Tuesday. Nonetheless, he failed to offer particular particulars about a few of the initiatives together with the names of contractors, contract quantities and challenge period.

The initiatives embody highway building, set up of road lights and buy of buses, all of which ought to ordinarily observe a aggressive bidding course of as stipulated by the Public Procurement Act.

Not less than 16 contracts on the listing are lined by the Public Procurement Act. But, solely three of those initiatives have the names of contractors, period of the challenge and contract quantity listed, indicating an absence of transparency which is without doubt one of the challenges the Procurement Act was meant to unravel. All of the 13 different initiatives lack not less than one in every of these important particulars of the initiatives.

Mr Onanuga didn’t reply to our reporter’s name and messages asking him to offer the main points of the initiatives. The reporter despatched him a textual content and WhatsApp message, each of which have been delivered to his cellphone however he has but to reply.

Consultants in public procurement and accountability expressed fear that it has develop into a tradition for FEC-approved initiatives to violate the federation’s legal guidelines whereas missing transparency and due course of.

In separate interviews, Ijeoma Okereke-Adagba, the Mission Supervisor of accountability platform UDEME, on the Centre for Journalism Innovation and Improvement (CJID) and Ayo Ladipo, the Head of Tracka, an accountability challenge of BudgIT, a civic tech organisation, famous that lack of transparency is a well-liked problem recognized with initiatives accredited by FEC.

Mrs Okereke-Adagba stated the FEC-approved initiatives routinely violate legal guidelines together with the environmental influence evaluation for initiatives that will displace individuals or properties.

She stated the character of the initiatives, normally shrouded in secrecy, “makes it very troublesome for CSOs to trace, and makes it very troublesome for residents to carry the federal government accountable. It additionally makes it very troublesome so that you can inform what goes into the negotiations of the contracts and the ultimate selections and even to learn how a lot has been launched.”

Ms Ladipo expressed concern concerning the building of the Court docket of Attraction constructing which Mr Onanuga stated was accredited at a value of N37 billion. She stated N10 billion was initially budgeted for the challenge within the 2023 supplementary funds.

“I don’t know what procurement course of allowed you to get thrice of what was within the supplementary funds,” she stated.

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Nonetheless, public officers have prior to now defined that the prices of main multi-year initiatives are sometimes damaged into bits in several budgets primarily based on the supply of funds. This could imply that each the N10 billion within the 2023 supplementary funds and the N37 billion within the 2024 funds are meant for a similar building of the attraction courtroom constructing.

Nonetheless, within the particulars supplied, Mr Tinubu’s aide didn’t specify the period of completion of the courtroom of attraction constructing or whether or not any price part of the challenge has been deferred to subsequent budgets.

Initiatives lacking important particulars

PREMIUM TIMES produces under, the 16 contracts awarded by FEC, as introduced by Mr Onanuhighlighting the lacking particulars.

Consultants converse

Mrs Okereke-Adagba famous that the shortage of transparency and due course of is without doubt one of the challenges her organisation has recognized with contracts accredited by the FEC.

She stated the initiatives are normally accredited for implementation with out a aggressive bidding course of and with out the data of the Bureau of Public Procurement, the arm of presidency established to vet all federal authorities initiatives.

She stated the FEC routinely violates legal guidelines together with the environmental influence evaluation for initiatives that will displace individuals or properties.

Often, the BPP is simply contacted to offer a certificates of no objection, Mrs Okereke-Adagba stated.

“One of many methods we’ve seen these play numerous instances is for giant initiatives funded by worldwide companions. It could possibly be by multilateral organisations, it could possibly be by China or the US,” she advised PREMIUM TIMES.

“And when this occurs we see numerous infringement occurring. For instance, there isn’t a aggressive bidding in contracts awarded. You’d be shocked to know that contractors have already been given categorical awards for implementation of those contracts.”

Mrs Okereke-Adagaba famous that such actions make all the course of vulnerable to corruption and poor accountability.

She added that the shortage of transparency has made it very troublesome for Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) to watch initiatives and for residents to carry the federal government accountable.

“It additionally makes it very troublesome so that you can inform what goes into the negotiations of the contracts and the ultimate selections and even to learn how a lot has been launched. Aside from what we hear after they come out and inform us, it is going to be very onerous so that you can see paperwork to again this up, when the contracts have been awarded, the period, and if the fee was revised in some unspecified time in the future. Who’re the main actors? You’ll discover these afterward. Possibly in 5 years and perhaps by that point, numerous corruption could have taken place.”

“We’ve labored with the BPP a number of instances earlier than and so they’re incapacitated. There’s actually nothing they will do besides obey the command from above and FEC is a really robust …. physique in Nigeria. No matter they determine at that stage is ultimate.”

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Transparency regressing

Ms Ladipo of Tracka stated she believes transparency is regressing underneath the Tinubu administration.

She stated particulars of the 2024 constituency initiatives in addition to the funds implementation report for the third and fourth quarter of 2023 are but to be made public, a scenario she described as uncommon and a regression for transparency and accountability.

Ms Ladipo added that the main points of initiatives awarded by FEC are normally not made public regardless that they need to be revealed on the web site of the Bureau of Public Procurement.

“However the Bureau of Public Procurement’s web site will not be practical. As of yesterday, as of this week, as of right now, it’s not practical. So you possibly can’t even go and test for these particulars,” she stated.

She added that the 2024 funds uploaded on the funds workplace’s web site is a scanned doc that’s not machine-readable, a scenario she suspects is an try to frustrate civil society actors, media and residents from looking for accountability.

“For the primary time in a protracted whereas, the (2024 funds) doc on the funds workplace web site is a scanned doc. It’s not readable, it’s not in a machine-readable format. In order that’s double work for analysts to do. And we discover that that’s a really mischievous assault to dam out the makes an attempt to dam out the efforts of civil society actors, media and residents,” she stated.

“…it’s simply an effort meant to frustrate the efforts of those that wish to maintain this authorities accountable and it’s one thing that now we have to take as an emergency. It’s an actual emergency in our palms.”