PPDC Trains Stakeholders On Open Contracting In Kaduna

As quest to make governance open as much as possible in Nigeria lingers, a non-governmental organization, Public and Private Development Centre (PPDC) with support from MacArthur Foundation, has organised a two-day workshop on open contracting for stakeholders in Kaduna state. 

The stakekeholders, which comprised of ministries, department and agencies (MDAs), civil society and media, are being trained on practical ways of tracking public procurements in Kaduna state as a way of strengthening its open government partnership (OGP) which the state subscribed to at sub-national level in 2016.

Speaking during the meeting holding between Wednesday and Thursday at a hotel in Kaduna, Software Developer, PPDC, Adekunle Adelowo, described the workshop as child of necessity designed to ensure transparency and accountability in public expenditures, capable of reducing corruption.

 
To him, open contracting simply means when both citizens and government engage with how available resources are being expended in the interest of the majority of the citizens thereby improving their standard of living. 

Acccording to the digital expert, when government made bidding for contacting open, the level of individual influence on  such contract is limited adding that, open contracting would not only reduced corruption but would ensure the best firm get the job.

Co-chair, Open Contracting Technical Working Group, OGP, Barrister Rebecca Sako-John, reiterated the need for healthy collaboration between the government and the citizens in order to reduce malpractices in contracting.

According to her, the ideal transparency was just evolving in Kaduna state due to some bottlenecks which are quite surmountable as time went by.

She suggested the need for civil society to identify their strengths and collaborate to facilitate human face development in the state.

She however urged the participants to make judicious use of the opportunity to equip themselves with necessary tools that would enhance their project tracking henceforth.