Removing hurdles to timely implementation of projects
Saturday, 25 April 2009
At the end of each fiscal year, the implementing agencies of the government have to come in for a lot of flak from higher government authorities, the press as well as from the donors. For the delays in project implementation lead to the return of the unutilised funds to their source in the government. The winding up of the development projects in this manner causes wastage of public fund, valuable time and human energy. Corruption and sloth in the administration of the project implementing agencies have generally been blamed for such delays. Which is why every government in the past promised measures to remove corruption and infuse dynamism in the administration for ensuring completion of the development projects in time. But the mission has remained largely unfulfilled. For the vices of sloth and corruption are so deeply ingrained in the work culture of the administration that all the complaints made against those from the public, the press and even the development partners have gone mostly unheeded.
However, there are also reasons other than purely human behind the delays, misuse and wastage of public funds allocated for development projects, included in the Annual Development Programmes (ADPs). To demonstrate the magnitude of the wastage of public resources that such delays in project implementation may cause one need not go too far. The implementation status of the ADP projects worth Tk 256 billion in the current fiscal (2008-09) speaks volumes for that. In the eight months between July 2008 and February 2009, 34 per cent of the ADP projects could be implemented! How much can one then hope to achieve during the next four months left for the tasks to complete?
Who is or are to take responsibility for this inordinate delay in project implementation and the consequent loss to the public and the state? The reasons for the delay in project implementation deal only with human follies like indecisions, corruption, lethargy or political pressure. In this connection, one needs also to take other probable causes into consideration for the delays that cannot be directly blamed on the government officials in charge of project implementation. Those are the laws and the rules that guide the operation of the projects from their beginning to the end. The rules are often difficult and in the cases of donor-funded projects, in particular, some conditions punched into the already existing Public Procurement Act of 2006 at the instance of the donors have made things more complicated. For example, a particular donor-suggested clause, incorporated in 2007 into the Public Procurement Act of 2006, was a cause for serious problems for the project implementers while procuring the materials and services for projects. Many public bodies have on different occasions complained to the relevant authorities in the government against such donor-dictated provisions in the procurement rules of the government.
So, both human and technical reasons can be faulted to the failure of the projects' completion within the deadline. This particular aspect of the Public Procurement Rules (PPR) framed in January 2008, which is coming in the way of speedier project implementation, has drawn the attention of the government.
In this connection, the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) has asked the Implementation, Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED) to invite suggestions from the different implementing agencies of the government for any changes to be effected in the existing procurement rules. On this score, some of the ministries are learnt to have informed the IMED that the donor-dictated guidelines allowing two to four weeks' time for submission of tenders have been causing serious delays in procurement of materials and services towards project implementation. This discrepancy in project implementation, therefore, demands due attention of the government. The step taken by the government to remove the technical problems in the PPR prejudicing project implementation in due time will therefore, he appreciated.
However, there are also reasons other than purely human behind the delays, misuse and wastage of public funds allocated for development projects, included in the Annual Development Programmes (ADPs). To demonstrate the magnitude of the wastage of public resources that such delays in project implementation may cause one need not go too far. The implementation status of the ADP projects worth Tk 256 billion in the current fiscal (2008-09) speaks volumes for that. In the eight months between July 2008 and February 2009, 34 per cent of the ADP projects could be implemented! How much can one then hope to achieve during the next four months left for the tasks to complete?
Who is or are to take responsibility for this inordinate delay in project implementation and the consequent loss to the public and the state? The reasons for the delay in project implementation deal only with human follies like indecisions, corruption, lethargy or political pressure. In this connection, one needs also to take other probable causes into consideration for the delays that cannot be directly blamed on the government officials in charge of project implementation. Those are the laws and the rules that guide the operation of the projects from their beginning to the end. The rules are often difficult and in the cases of donor-funded projects, in particular, some conditions punched into the already existing Public Procurement Act of 2006 at the instance of the donors have made things more complicated. For example, a particular donor-suggested clause, incorporated in 2007 into the Public Procurement Act of 2006, was a cause for serious problems for the project implementers while procuring the materials and services for projects. Many public bodies have on different occasions complained to the relevant authorities in the government against such donor-dictated provisions in the procurement rules of the government.
So, both human and technical reasons can be faulted to the failure of the projects' completion within the deadline. This particular aspect of the Public Procurement Rules (PPR) framed in January 2008, which is coming in the way of speedier project implementation, has drawn the attention of the government.
In this connection, the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) has asked the Implementation, Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED) to invite suggestions from the different implementing agencies of the government for any changes to be effected in the existing procurement rules. On this score, some of the ministries are learnt to have informed the IMED that the donor-dictated guidelines allowing two to four weeks' time for submission of tenders have been causing serious delays in procurement of materials and services towards project implementation. This discrepancy in project implementation, therefore, demands due attention of the government. The step taken by the government to remove the technical problems in the PPR prejudicing project implementation in due time will therefore, he appreciated.