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Ms Sarah Adwoa Safo
Ms Sarah Adwoa Safo

Adwoa Safo initiates moves to get procurement laws codified

The Minister of State in charge of Public Procurement, Ms Sarah Adwoa Safo, has served notice to the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice to, as a matter of urgency, codify the two laws governing public procurement in the country to make it easy and simple for use.

She was speaking during a working visit to the Bulk Oil Storage and Transportation (BOST) Company Limited last Friday where she interacted with some top management officials about the need to re-align their operations to fit into the government’s policy.

Her visit forms part of her scheduled activities to public or state-owned institutions or companies that are heavily involved in procurement activities.

Procurement Act

According to the Procurement Minister, the laws, Public Procurement Act (Act 663) and Public Procurement (Amendment) Act (Act 914), make it cumbersome for easy reading and referencing since players in the public procurement chain would have to use the two documents at all times in order not to find themselves at the wrong side of the law.

Out of the 99 Sections in the Public Procurement Act (Act 663), 55 Sections have been amended.

That means in the absence of a single codified law, the two existing laws must be used at all times for one to be on the safer side.

That, Ms Safo believed, put much burden on the individual who would have to spend more time in making references to the two documents.

To save time and make reference to the law easy, Ms Safo, who is also the deputy Majority Leader of Parliament and the MP for Dome-Kwabenya, said she was in touch with the Attorney-General to help codify the two laws and make it easy for referencing.

History of Laws

The Public Procurement Act, 2003, Act 663 was passed in 2003 and came into operation in 2004 as part of the government’s public financial reforms. It was amended to propel public procurement into a second generation of reform and to streamline bottlenecks identified over a decade of its implementation.

The Public Procurement (Amendment) Bill was March 18, 2016 passed by Parliament into an Act (Act 914), thus amending the Public Procurement Act, 2003 (Act 663).

The amendments re-categorised government institutions to include organisations not initially covered. Thresholds have been increased across the board and procurement entities reconstituted to ensure efficient administration of the increased thresholds.

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