The Minister of Works and Housing, Mr Babatunde Fashola, has recommended an amendment to the Procurement Act to allow small and medium companies to execute certain projects in the country.
Fashola made the recommendation on Thursday while defending the ministry’s 2021 budget before the House of Representatives Committee on Works in Abuja.
The minister said that unless the act was amended, the Executive Order 5, issued by the President would not be achieved.
“If you go through the procurement law, as it currently is, the truth is that, only a certain type of contractors can bid for certain projects; that is just the law.
“If you go through the law and the threshold that has been set, it favours only certain class of contractors, based on their turnovers; otherwise, they will not pass the technical and financial evaluation.
“Until we urgently revisit our procurement law in order to make it more accommodating of small and medium-sized companies, in order to achieve the President’s Order 5 of including local component and capacity contractors; then we won’t really have the spread.
“As it is, only few contractors can reach this threshold; that is a matter of eminent legislative consideration and amendment,” he said.
Speaking on the 2020 budget performance, Fashola said that the sum of N152.1 billion was released to the works sector of the ministry, which represented 66.74 per cent of the N227.9 billion capital allocation in the 2020 appropriation.
He said that N77.9 billion was released for highways (works sector) from the budget.
He said that N333.1 million was released to the ministry for overhead costs between January and July, which represented 66.49 per cent of the budgetary provision, with an outstanding N95.8 million.
The minister said that the personnel cost of N8.8 billion allocated for the ministry was being implemented through the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) Programme in the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation.
However, Fashola said that N229.9 million was generated as revenue from January to September and remitted to the Consolidated Revenue Account.
On the 2021 budget, the minister said that N435.3 billion was proposed for the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing and its parastatal agencies for capital, personnel and overhead estimates in the 2021 Appropriation Bill.
The Chairman of the Committee on Works, Rep. Kabir Abubakar (APC-Kano) said that the committee would consider the 2021 budget proposal speedily.
He said that the committee would strive to maintain the January to December budget cycle, saying that if there were needs for further clarifications, the committee would write the ministry.
