adminEmmah Chinyamutangira Manicaland Correspondent
THE Procurement Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (PRAZ) has expressed concern over the late submission of bids, which it says is causing delays in public procurement processes.
The authority introduced five standard bidding documents in terms of Section 6 (1) of the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets Act Chapter (22:23), to be used by procuring entities when they are procuring goods, services, works and consultancy.
Speaking during a training workshop in Mutare on Tuesday, PRAZ operations director Mr Clever Ruswa said the late submission of bids was delaying everything.
“We are encountering a great challenge with the late submission of bids,” he said.
“We are encouraging bidders to submit their documents before deadlines for the benefit of the public.
“Late bids may be rejected even if the bidder had the best price.”
Mr Ruswa said PRAZ was committed to attaining economic value in procurement processes and create fair competition to ensure that public procurement and disposal of public assets in Zimbabwe is done in a manner that is transparent and cost effective.
He said another challenge that suppliers faced after a bid was over specification by bidders.
“We remove other bidders unnecessarily from the tender process because suppliers do not understand our requests,” said Mr Ruswa.
“This is an area that we want to look at. We should capacitate bidders with technical skills and this will be done by procurement professionals.
“We don’t want the public to lose value for money simply because suppliers failed to understand the things specified in the bid.”
Online Reporter