Over 19,000 projects abandoned in the country – Emeka Eze tells Senate

The immediate past Director-General of the Bureau of Public Procurement, BPP, Emeka Eze, yesterday, told the Senate that about 19,000 government projects are currently abandoned across the country

He pointed out that aside duplication of office buildings, personnel and overhead cost, there was the tendency for agencies of government to assert their authority in the procurement process.

Eze, who was speaking at a one- day public hearing organised by the Senate Committee on Procurement to amend the Public Procurement Act 2007 to provide for and adopt a local content policy and timely completion of procurement processes, disclosed that projects abandonment was mainly due to non-payment for interim certificates for work done.

He said if there must be efficient service delivery among the agencies of government involved in procurement and disposal of public assets, the Federal Government should merge the BPP; Bureau for Public Enterprise, BPE, and Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission, ICRC, into one strong commission, in line with global best practices.

Eze said, “It is my humble opinion that now that the nation’s resources are dwindling, the right thing to do is for the legislature to be courageous enough and merge all the three agencies involved in procurement and disposal of public assets into a strong commission.

“I want to assure that the nation will be better for it if BPE, BPP and ICRC are merged.”

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