The Ministry of Infrastructure is organizing a workshop to harmonize practices for the benefit of its regional leaders from October 21 to 26, 2024 in Bobo-Dioulasso. The work will take place in the meeting room of the Hauts-Bassins regional infrastructure directorate.
The Ministry of Infrastructure wants to keep the road network and tracks in good condition. To achieve this goal, a maintenance strategy was put in place with the back marking of contracts for routine maintenance work in the department as well as the delegation of project management to departmental management groups. The implementation of this strategy requires better coordination of activities and harmonization of practices in all regions. It is to meet these challenges that the thirteen regional leaders of the Ministry of Infrastructure of Burkina Faso met in Bobo-Dioulasso for a work session. According to Michel Kafando, Director of Legal Affairs and Litigation (DAJC) of the Ministry of Infrastructure, “the general objective of this working session is to share and coordinate good practices for management of the road network”. According to him, it is as a result of a new reform that the Ministry of Infrastructure has decided to rely on the award and performance of public contracts for routine maintenance for the sectors. “This means that regional management now has a big responsibility in relation to these markets. After a few months of implementing this new practice, the regional leaders felt it was important to meet to agree so that there would not be too many problems. The transfer of procurement to the department was prompted by difficulty due to the importance of the contracts to be awarded to the Directorate of Public Procurement (DMP) of the Ministry,” explained Mr Kafando.
On average 120 to 135 markets per year
And this expert in legal matters says that the DMP performs on average 120 to 135 contracts per year. The standard maintenance markets were a major problem with the importance of the files being searched, audited and published. This situation caused such a delay that at one point there was an overlap. For the 2023 budget year for example, Michel Kafando pointed out that contracts could be awarded and implemented in year n+1 towards the end of the year. However, with this concentration, each Regional Director manages his part. “It’s mostly reliable and fluid,” he says. Several points will be discussed during this work session. This concerns the legal side of contract management, the conditions for the termination and closure of contracts followed by exchanges, the financial side of contract management and the sharing of knowledge on the process of awarding standard maintenance contracts. All these communications will be followed by an exchange. Wendpanga Hyacinthe Ilboudo, Director of Public Procurement (DMP) of the Ministry of Infrastructure, specified that this workshop is particularly focused on the procedures for the execution and negotiation of public contracts. “We have already gone to show the regional leaders how to award contracts, now we are at the execution stage. So it was good practice for us to go back and explain to them how public contracts are carried out and implemented. They have specific concerns that we, the facilitators, will provide some answers to harmonize ideas. The DAJC and the DMP do a lot of awarding processes so that we have a lot of material to give recommendations to those who have just started awarding contracts to avoid certain problems related to the misunderstanding of the texts,” said – he closed. Yassia Ouédraogo, Regional Director of Infrastructure for the Center-South, has welcomed one of his colleagues on this initiative of the ministry that will allow the Regional Directors to successfully implement this reform and allowing the road network to be in better shape.
Ousmane TRAORE
