Effects of public procurement and disposal act on procurement in parastatals in Kenya

Abstract

The public procurement system in Kenya has evolved to an orderly and legally regulated system governed by the PPDA, 2005. Prior to this, in Central Government it was governed by Treasury Circulars from 1969, then the Supplies Manual of 1978, before the promulgation of the Exchequer and Audit (Public Procurement) Regulations, 2001.The PPDA, effective as of 1st January 2007, applies to all procurement of goods, works and services, as well as the disposal of assets by public entities. The Public procurement processes is a complex issue because of the multiple interests and objectives it strives to achieve simultaneously coupled by the multiple regulatory policies and bodes it has to adhere to. The objective of this study was to look at the effects of PPDA on public procurement in Parastatals in Kenya. However the specific objectives were to establish the effect of PPDA on the procurement process in Paratatals in Kenya and find out find out the challenges to the implementation of the PPDA. The study adopted a cross sectional descriptive research design. For the purposes of this study, the population of interest was all parastatals in Kenya based in the Nairobi County. The study adopted proportionate stratified Sampling design. Primary data was collected for the purpose of this study. It was collected using interviewer administered questionnaires. The questionnaires were piloted with three subject experts before final administration. The filled questionnaires was inspected for completeness and edited. The study targeted a sample of 30 respondents out of which 22 respondents filled in and returned the questionnaire giving a response rate of 73%. The study concluded that that PPDA improved the competitiveness of the procurement processes among parastatals. In addition PPDA improved the quality of services and goods delivered, and finally it promoted ethical standards among Parastatals in procurement. On the challenges of PPDA, the study concluded that corrupt officers, unresponsive bids ignorance of the PPDA guidelines, inefficiency of the PPOA on enforcing the penalties to the offenders and lack of organizational incentives & pressures for Public procurement guidelines implementation were to a great extent challenges