AN ASSESSMENT OF THE LEVEL OF POLITICAL INTERFERENCE IN THE IMPLEMENTATION OF PUBLIC PROCUREMENT IN PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS. A CASE STUDY OF THE EDO STATE CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION

The research project an assessment of the level of political interference in the implementation of public procurement in public institutions. The objective of this study aimed at assessing the level of political interference in the implementation of Public Procurement process, identifying other factors affecting public procurement implementation in public institutions and suggesting some possible remedies to preventing political interference in public procurement implementation in public institutions. For this study, the survey research design was adopted. The choice of the design was informed by the objectives of the study as outlined in chapter one. This research design provides a quickly efficient and accurate means of assessing information about a population of interest. The population for this study were workers in Civil Service Commission in Edo state, Nigeria. A total of 134 respondents were selected from the population figure out of which the sample size was determined. Public procurement activities suffer from neglect, lack of direction, poor co-ordination, lack of open competition and transparency, differing levels of corruption and most importantly not having a cadre of trained and qualified procurement
specialists, who are competent to conduct and manage such procurements, in a professional, timely and cost-effective manner. Inflexible and bureaucratic systems of procurement contribute to unacceptable contract delays, increased costs, the potential for manipulation of contract awards and lack of fair competition, all of which create the perception in the population at large, that public expenditure is slow, ineffective, expensive and often corrupt