Budget 2015: Government is set to introduce measures aimed at stamping out fraud and other issues in its supply chain, including a central supplier database and a centralised e-tender portal.
Addressing Parliament this afternoon on the occasion of this year's budget speech, finance minister Nhlanhla Nene said, from April, government will introduce a central supplier database, and suppliers will only have to register once when they do business with the state.
This will "significantly reduce the administrative burden for businesses, especially small and medium-sized enterprises," said Nene.
The database will interface with the South African Revenue Service, the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission and the state's payroll system. It will electronically verify a supplier's tax and empowerment status, and allow for the identification of public sector officials doing business with the state, he said.
This is set to reduce the administrative burden for officials working in supply chain management roles, and address many of the concerns raised by the auditor-general every year.
The database comes against the backdrop of the state's need to provide better value for money in public service delivery through "rigorous financial management, effective systems and an unrelenting fight against corruption".
"Supply chain management in the public sector is far from perfect. There are frequent allegations of corruption and inefficiency."
Nene said, as a result of defects within the system, National Treasury had conducted a review of the public sector supply chain management, and would introduce several reforms to tackle supply chain issues.
In addition, "in close collaboration" with the State IT Agency, a central e-tender portal will be implemented from April. All tenders will be advertised on this portal, and all tender documents will be "freely" available there.
Nene added tender advertisements in newspapers and government gazettes will be phased out.
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