The Anti- corruption commissioner Francis Ben Kaifala  has expressed his dissatisfaction with the Ministry of sports to members of the press as a result of several issues surrounding the Ministry  that were flagged by the 2020 Auditor General’s Report.

He emphasized that procurement method were not followed and supporting documents and evidences were not provided to Auditors . The Commissioner emphasized to members of the press because there are too many issues in the Ministry of Sport and the commission is going to check why.

The 2020 Auditor General’s Report pointed at the Ministry of sports that Procurement Methods were not followed and In contravention of the provision in Section 37(1) of the Public Procurement Act 2016, procurement methods indicated in the approved procurement plan were not adhered to by the Procurement Unit in the execution of selected procurement activities during 2019.

The report further pointed out that Sole-sourcing instead of Request for Quotations (RfQs) procurement method was used in procurement activities worth Le72,000,000. There was no evidence of approval from the Procurement Committee as well as from the NPPA and the Ministry of Finance.

The Auditors   therefore recommended for the submission of evidence of approval from the Procurement Committee as well as from the NPPA and the Ministry of Finance for the use of the sole-sourcing procurement method.  Official’s Response from the Permanent Secretary (PS) states:

(i) “Evidence of the two activities referred to above cannot be identified from the point of reference submitted in the draft.

(ii) No sole sourcing method was however applied in all procurement activities undertaken in the Financial Year 2019. The Ministry was challenged with the willingness by suppliers in doing business, because of the delay in receiving 395 payments for items supplied. Nevertheless, few suppliers were willing to undertake business venture with the Ministry irrespective of those aforementioned challenges.

The Permanent Secretary Concludes that the Procurement Committee is however planning to undertake Framework Contract with eligible supplier(s) in the future”.

However, The Auditor’s flagged that there was no evidence that the approved procurement method as indicated in the procurement plan was used. The issue is therefore unresolved