NACA DG Denies Mismanagement Of $19.6m Covid-19 Procurement Fund

The Director-General of the National Agency for the Control of AIDS (NACA), Gambo Aliyu, has denied any wrong doings in the management of $19.6m Covid-19 procurement fund from the Global Fund.

Global Fund indicted NACA Nigeria of awarding procurement contracts worth $19.6m to contractors without financial statements and unregistered businesses.

A crucial issue raised by Global Fund, a partnership designed to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, was the evaluation process of the NACA.

The indictment was contained in the Audit Report titled, ‘Global Fund Grants in the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

The Global Fund “audit noted non-adherence with eligibility requirements for 67% (6 out of 9) of sampled procurements totalling US$7.5 million, where vendors were awarded contracts without providing bank/performance guarantees, despite this being a pre-condition for contract awards. A joint venture was awarded two contracts worth US$3.5 million without being legally registered, and without providing the bank/performance guarantee.

“In addition, eight of nine sampled vendors were awarded contracts amounting to US$8.6 million despite not providing certified financial statements. The absence of key tender documents to assess vendor performance poses risks of suppliers not being able to execute contracts or deliver on time.

“NACA’s procurement evaluation process lacks technical and financial scoring criteria to assess the best-suited bidder beyond the set eligibility criteria. Contracts were awarded to the lowest price bidder regardless of their technical capacity.

“Some suppliers were unable to fulfil contracts as expected, due to their lack of capacity to handle large orders, and others supplied sub-standard commodities. For example, 63,056 procured masks by CRS were rejected by the sub-recipient, Association for Civil Society in Malaria Control, Immunization and Nutrition, as unusable, while a US$3.5 million contract to supply coveralls and lab gowns was awarded to a vendor who had only previously handled contracts totalling US$71k, and who subsequently requested to extend the delivery period from six to twelve weeks.”

But the DG denied any form of “misconduct and misappropriation” of the fund meant for Covid-19 related procurement.

Aliyu said on Arise TV interview. “Nigeria as it is at the moment is under additional safeguard policy. This emanated from what happened in 2016 where Nigeria was asked to refund money to the global fund because of some activities that were identified and found to be fraudulent.

“So, Global Fund does not spare any individual where such activities are found. So, from 2016 up until today as we are talking, measures have not been lifted in Nigeria and what that means is Nigeria works closely with the Global Fund on virtually everything. So, as we do procurement in NACA, we do it together with Global Fund. We do it together with Global Fund Geneva. There is nothing that is done here in the global fund that is not aware; Global Fund did not supervise and approve before it was done.

“So, I was surprised when I heard that there is a procurement process in NACA that Global Fund is indicting the government of Nigeria. This is totally false. If Global Fund indicts the Federal Government of Nigeria on the procurement process that is happening now at NACA, then it means the Global Fund stands indicted itself.”

The NACA boss said the accusations are a kind of routine queries that all recipients of funds from Global Fund in the country get to highlight system issues.

“There is no fraud in that report. There has never been an indictment in that report. If there is fraud, Global Fund would have officially written to Nigeria to let the Nigerian government know that there is A,B,C and D that is done inappropriately and they want the Nigerian Government to pay back,” he added.