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Public procurement is one of the most corruption-prone activities that governments undertake. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime cites several reasons for this situation, including the volume of transactions, the multitude of stakeholders, and the close interaction between public officials and businesses.
Corruption Watch (CW) has built up an extensive body of work around this very issue, including several reports on public procurement risk trends, regular contributions to and membership of the Procurement Reform Working Group, and an online platform for monitoring deviations, exclusions, and debarred suppliers, based on data supplied by National Treasury.
Now the City of Tshwane has entered the fray with its new e-commence and procurement (e-CP) portal which, it says, will boost the fight against corruption within the procurement system, enable faster and more efficient procurement, and facilitate better value for public money.
“E-procurement improves procurement inefficiencies and reduces both direct and indirect procurement-related costs,” wrote Matjatji Molepo and Mohammed Jahed in a 2022 journal article exploring the use of e-procurement as a tool to combat corruption in South Africa, “and improves the flow of information and information management.”
Furthermore, e-procurement provides a transparent and traceable record of transactions, improves public resource management and procurement performance, and gives suppliers more choice by expanding the supplier base.
Tshwane’s e-CP portal will digitise and automate supply chain management processes such as verification of suppliers and low-value procurement, and provide a full audit trail for every aspect of the process.
“This system will allow us to minimise human intervention in procurement,” said Tshwane’s mayoral committee member for finance, Jacqui Uys, “and assist with quality contract management.”
The first phase has been rolled out, said Uys, with the previous portal now fully migrated into the e-CP portal, which has robust security and audit tracking measures in place.
So far 18 000 vendors have been registered and the MMC assures that “a fair and equal opportunity will be given to all when they bid for a quotation.”
On registration, suppliers are automatically verified against National Treasury’s Central Supplier Database and Restricted Supplier Database. “For low-value procurement, the portal will automatically notify all registered suppliers to submit quotations for a particular good or service, and then automatically evaluate submitted quotations based on set policy criteria.”
The portal monitors and manages contract-related performance to check that suppliers are delivering on their contract terms. If not, said Uys, “both contractor and the contracting department will be held accountable. This includes blacklisting of suppliers and consequence management action against employees.”
Implementation will be rolled out in phases over the next year.
“The City has prioritised the implementation of the e-CP to ensure to that we strengthen our fight against fraud and corruption. Furthermore, action is being taken internally against all officials found responsible for wrongdoing and corruption related activities,” Uys concluded.
