SMEs welcome public procurement law
Small and Medium Enterprises Association of Malawi (Smea) has asked authorities to come up with deliberate policies to empower SMEs if the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Assets Act is to be a success.
Last month, Parliament passed an insertion to the Act which forces government to buy a minimum of 60 percent of its procurement needs from businesses run by indigenous Malawians.
The Bill means people with their family roots in the country and are in business will be having more chances of being chosen to provide goods and services to government entities if they get 60 percent even in a scenario where a foreign entity has scored 80 percent in procurement process.
However, in an interview on Tuesday, Smea president James Chiutsi said that failure to empower SMEs may leave a lot of indigenous enterprises failing to fulfill contracts.
“Trade associations should come up with deliberate policies to capacitate SMEs, otherwise they may still not be able to fulfill government orders,” he said.
Chairperson for the Budget and Finance Committee of Parliament, Rhino Chiphiko, is on record having said that while the current procurement law has so many gaps which expose it to corruption, the passage of the law was a landmark as parliamentarians had established a better law.
