Aurelio “Dong” D. Gonzales Jr. Photo from his Facebook
MANILA, Philippines — Noting that government agencies often blame problems in the government’s procurement process for their low utilization of funds, Senior Deputy Speaker Rep. Aurelio Gonzales Jr. is pushing to shorten the process by 45 days.
This is one of the proposals in House Bill No. 7944, or the Ang Bagong Pilipinas Government Procurement Reform Act, filed by Gonzales.
The bill seeks to repeal Republic Act No. 9184, or the 2003 Government Procurement Reform Act, in favor of a “simplified process of procurement.”
In HB 7944’s explanatory note, Gonzales said “now is the right time to create a new government procurement law that is both effective and timely to keep up with the global standards and further pave the way for economic growth and prosperity of the country.”
“At the core of this bill is the simplified process of procurement: to avoid delay, streamline the process and facilitate remarkable improvement in project delivery or completion timeline,” Gonzales said.
The House committee on revision of laws, chaired by Rep. Edward Maceda, began its deliberations on the measure on May 18.
In a statement on Monday, Gonzales stressed the need to update and streamline the government procurement system “to put an end to recurring delays in the acquisition of goods and services, and the awarding and implementation of infrastructure projects like roads, expressways and school buildings.”
He said the “perennial problem of weak absorptive capacity of some government agencies causes delay in carrying out crucial projects,” while government agencies with major underspending concerns “noted public procurement issues as a recurring reason for the low disbursement outturn.”
Gonzales pointed to the huge increase in expenditures since RA 9184 was enacted in 2003.He said infrastructure spending jumped more than tenfold. From P121 billion out of a national budget of P609 billion two decades ago, infrastructure spending is now at P1.311 trillion out of the P5.268 trillion budget this year.
HB 7944 proposed to shorten the procurement process from 72 days to 27 days, starting from the first day of the publication of the invitation to bid up to the posting of the notice of award and notice to proceed with the approved contract.
“This could be done by doing away with post-qualification as it is a duality to the requirement of prequalification. The delay in post-qualification is usually due to the government agency’s lack of manpower, distance of the location of the project and limited expertise of the contractor,” he said.
Gonzales added that another factor contributing to the delay is the fact that bids and awards committees are ad hoc bodies whose members have other duties and functions in their offices.
He suggested the creation of full-time prequalification, bids, and awards committees (PBAC) whose members would not be assigned any duty or responsibility except as chair, vice chair, and member of the PBAC.