Ugandan public procurement takes nearly 600 days, according to World Bank
By the AFREEQUE newsroom, based on UG Diplomat
The World Bank says public procurement in Uganda takes nearly 600 days, delaying the implementation of the projects it funds, its country director Francisca Ayodeji Akala told Speaker Jacob Marksons Oboth. He promised Parliament's intervention to speed up projects such as the electricity access programme, according to UG Diplomat.
Public procurement in Uganda can take nearly 600 days, the World Bank's country head for Uganda, Francisca Ayodeji Akala, said during a meeting at Parliament with Speaker Jacob Marksons Oboth, according to UG Diplomat. "Some of these things take time because the approval process is long. Public procurement in Uganda takes nearly 600 days," she said.
These delays slow the transformation of approved funding into concrete results, with procurement and contract management appearing to be the main points to fix, according to the World Bank. The Speaker cited the Electricity Access Scale-up Project (EASP), launched since the 2022/2023 financial year without electricity reaching the intended beneficiaries. "Both parties are in this room and we agree. So why does it take so long? It has become a blame game," he said.
Jacob Marksons Oboth asked the relevant parliamentary committees to work with the World Bank and government officials to identify and remove the blockages. He announced that a meeting would be convened bringing together the Prime Minister, the World Bank Group and the relevant government teams to establish a coordinated approach to speed up delayed projects. The meeting brought together the heads of Parliament's Budget, Finance and Public Accounts (central) committees.
The meeting comes after the Ugandan Parliament's rapprochement with the Russian Duma on 31 October, and as the World Bank recently linked Kenya's expensive electricity to opaque contracts.
