Abstract
The Kenyan public procurement sector has gone though colossal reforms, which were ignited by findings of country procurement assessment reports of 1986 and 1997; and hallmarked by formulation of the Procurement Regulations in 2001. This study aimed at establishing the extent to which public secondary schools in Nairobi City County had complied with relevant legislative provisions guiding procurement reforms, as well as the effect of selected aspects of reforms on expenditure management. The article focuses on one aspect of reforms, namely, frequency of emergency procurement. The evaluation research model III guided the research process and primary data were sourced in 2015 from 35 public secondary schools. Quantitative analysis included cross-tabulation with analysis of variance, chi-square statistic, correlation coefficient, as well as multiple regression. About two-thirds of the schools had developed procurement plans, as required by the legislative and policy provisions; while another two-thirds ‘occasionally’ practised emergency procurement. Besides, the frequency of emergency procurement significantly correlated with variation in procurement expenditure; and further caused a significant increment in procurement expenditure (beta weight = 0.457, t-statistic = 3.240 & ρ-value = 0.003), which signifies a negative influence on expenditure management. Limiting the frequency of emergency procurement is an important step towards effective expenditure management in public secondary schools.
Highlights
Public procurement is the acquisition by purchase, rental, lease, hire, license, tenancy, franchise or by any other contractual means of any type of goods, services, and works, by public institutions using public resources, as well as disposal of public assets (Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission [KACC] & Public Procurement Oversight Authority [PPOA], 2009)
Public procurement plays a greater role in developing countries, where the value of procurement expenditure ranges between 9% and 13% of national Gross Domestic Products (GDP), than it does in developed nations, where the value varies between 5% and 8% of the national GDP
Whereas the first pattern shows that procurement expenditure reduced consistently from the period before reforms, to the period during reforms and further down to the period after reforms; the second pattern indicates that procurement expenditure reduced from the period before reforms, to the period during reforms; but later increased during the period after reforms
Summary
Public procurement is the acquisition by purchase, rental, lease, hire, license, tenancy, franchise or by any other contractual means of any type of goods, services, and works, by public institutions using public resources, as well as disposal of public assets (Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission [KACC] & Public Procurement Oversight Authority [PPOA], 2009). Public procurement is the main process through which government spends public money; making it central to expenditure management and national development. Circa 60% of government revenue is injected into the economy, which in turn, creates employment opportunities and improves per capita income (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD], 2001). In Kenya, the value of public procurement accounts for about 10% of the GDP, making it a large market for suppliers and contractors, albeit with high opportunities for corruption (Kavula, Kalai & Migosi, 2014; KACC & PPOA, 2009). Public procurement is categorised into contestable and non-contestable. Contestable procurement is subject to competitive bidding, non-contestable procurement is often single-sourced (Kenya Institute of Public Policy and Research [KIPPRA], 2006; Trionfetti, 2000). In Kenya, contestable public procurement forms about 35% of the total public expenditure, making it the single biggest item of public spending, ahead of salaries and ijbm.ccsenet.org
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